We are IntechOpen, the world's leading publisher of Open Access books Built by scientists, for scientists

5,000+

Open access books available

125,000+

140M+

International authors and editors

Downloads

Our authors are among the

Top 1% most cited scientists

12.2%

Contributors from top 500 universities

Selection of our books indexed in the Book Citation Index in Web of Science™ Core Collection (BKCI)

### Interested in publishing with us? Contact book.department@intechopen.com

Numbers displayed above are based on latest data collected. For more information visit www.intechopen.com

## Meet the editors

Basyouni Hamada is Professor of Communication and Public Opinion in the Department of Mass Communication, Qatar University. Previously, he served as Dean and Deputy Dean for a number of colleges of mass communication. His articles have appeared in *Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly*, *Journalism Studies*, *Journal of International Communication*, *Journal of Development Communication*, *Journal of Global Media and Com-*

*munication*, *Journal of Arab and Muslim Communication Research, Global Media Journal* and the *Egyptian Journal of Communication Research*. His teaching and research focus on the interdisciplinary areas of communication and journalism including communication theories, political communication and public opinion, journalism ethics, press freedom, Arab media transformation, the Islamic perspective of communication, journalists autonomy. He is a member of the Worlds of Journalism Study and Journalism Students across the Globe as well as several communication societies and research projects. Professor Hamada has established and reviewed numerous journalism and mass communication programs and currently serves on several editorial boards of international refereed journals.

Saodah Wok is a professor in the Department of Communication at the International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM). She obtained her BAgricSc (UM) in Plant Physiology and Extension Education/Communication; an MS in Development Communication (UPM) in Agriculture Journalism; and a PhD (UW-Madison) in Mass Communications, specializing in Organizational Communication. Her research interests are organizational communi-

cation, new media, journalism, and women studies. She has written books, chapters in books, presented conference and seminar papers, and written for national and international in journals. She is an associate editor for Intellectual Discourse and has reviewed many articles for publications. She used to be Head of Department, Head of Research, and Deputy Dean for the Faculty Postgraduate Program.

Contents

**Section 1**

Determinants

*by Basyouni Ibrahim Hamada*

*by Abdullah K. Al-Kindi*

*by Oluremi Davies Ogun*

Issues: The Case of Algeria *by Abdelkader Abdelali*

The Saudi Case Explored

*by Hesham Mesbah and Nasser Almujaibel*

*by Chipo Kanjo*

**Section 2**

Corruption in the Arab World *by Abdulrahman Al-Shami*

Poverty by Design: The Role of ICT

Horizons? An Analytical-Critical Study

A Theory of Corruption and Productivity Growth

**Preface III**

Journalism and Corruption - Theory and Research **1**

**Chapter 1 3**

**Chapter 2 35**

**Chapter 3 57**

**Chapter 4 79**

**Chapter 5 85**

**Chapter 6 101**

and Threats **117**

**Chapter 7 119**

Traditional and Online Journalism and Corruption Investigation

Integration of Traditional with New Journalism - Opportunities

Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"?

Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of

Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future

Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering

### Contents



Preface

This book is a result of my conviction that journalism can contribute to the fight against corruption. My interest in examining the relationship between off and online journalism and corruption developed during my work on "Press freedom and corruption," a joint effort with Dr. Abdel-Salam G Abdel-Salam and Dr. Elsayed Abdelwahed Elkilany published in *Global Media and Communication* in 2019. In this article, we analyzed several variables including press freedom, corruption, democracy and rule of law in 111 countries over a period of 12 years from 2004 to 2015. We found that countries with greater levels of press freedom tend to have lesser levels of corruption and that interaction of press freedom and democracy, as well as press freedom and rule of law, simultaneously reduces corruption levels. The striking results suggest that rule of law reduces corruption regardless of the level of press freedom. A result that is not applicable to democracy that requires the press to be free [1].

One of the major lessons that I learned from writing this article is that free and independent journalism plays a central role in compacting the most dangerous political, social and economic ills that humankind is suffering from. While journalism has become a matured science in its own right with strong linkages to all social sciences, journalism scholars have not paid sufficient attention to the study of journalism and corruption. The existing theoretical and empirical literature on corruption is mainly driven by economists, political scientists and sociologists whose main objective is to understand its determinants, causes and consequences [2–10].

The value of journalism studies in the next decades, I argue, is anchored on their potential to understand, predict and control corruption. Meanwhile, the international anti-corruption policies of the World Bank, International Monetary Fund (IMF) and other international and regional organizations are of little value if they do not consider journalism as one of corruption's determinants. What complicates the situation is that journalism does not operate in a vacuum; it is an integral part of the socioeconomic and cultural structures of any society. The challenging question is how to study variables pertaining to several levels interacting together to restrain or spread corruption. This question suggests a conceptual, universal, cross-cultural, multi-disciplinary perspective beyond the traditionally single studies dedicated to examining a direct

The first chapter of this book develops a hierarchical universal theory of journalism corruption determinants. Its purpose is to facilitate the integration of journalism as a social institution in the social science studies of corruption. I hope that journalism scholars as well as scholars of other social sciences will offer me the honor of testing the hypotheses of this theory. I also welcome comments, suggestions and criticisms that will be considered to refine the theory and to improve its components in the

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption: International Comparative Analysis* is a unique book in terms of the diversity of academic and intellectual background of its contributors, the depth of analyses and the variety of methodologies. The book is a useful source for understanding the linkages of journalism and corruption

linear relationship within a specific level or sub-level.

forthcoming edition of the book.

## Preface

This book is a result of my conviction that journalism can contribute to the fight against corruption. My interest in examining the relationship between off and online journalism and corruption developed during my work on "Press freedom and corruption," a joint effort with Dr. Abdel-Salam G Abdel-Salam and Dr. Elsayed Abdelwahed Elkilany published in *Global Media and Communication* in 2019. In this article, we analyzed several variables including press freedom, corruption, democracy and rule of law in 111 countries over a period of 12 years from 2004 to 2015. We found that countries with greater levels of press freedom tend to have lesser levels of corruption and that interaction of press freedom and democracy, as well as press freedom and rule of law, simultaneously reduces corruption levels. The striking results suggest that rule of law reduces corruption regardless of the level of press freedom. A result that is not applicable to democracy that requires the press to be free [1].

One of the major lessons that I learned from writing this article is that free and independent journalism plays a central role in compacting the most dangerous political, social and economic ills that humankind is suffering from. While journalism has become a matured science in its own right with strong linkages to all social sciences, journalism scholars have not paid sufficient attention to the study of journalism and corruption. The existing theoretical and empirical literature on corruption is mainly driven by economists, political scientists and sociologists whose main objective is to understand its determinants, causes and consequences [2–10].

The value of journalism studies in the next decades, I argue, is anchored on their potential to understand, predict and control corruption. Meanwhile, the international anti-corruption policies of the World Bank, International Monetary Fund (IMF) and other international and regional organizations are of little value if they do not consider journalism as one of corruption's determinants. What complicates the situation is that journalism does not operate in a vacuum; it is an integral part of the socioeconomic and cultural structures of any society. The challenging question is how to study variables pertaining to several levels interacting together to restrain or spread corruption. This question suggests a conceptual, universal, cross-cultural, multi-disciplinary perspective beyond the traditionally single studies dedicated to examining a direct linear relationship within a specific level or sub-level.

The first chapter of this book develops a hierarchical universal theory of journalism corruption determinants. Its purpose is to facilitate the integration of journalism as a social institution in the social science studies of corruption. I hope that journalism scholars as well as scholars of other social sciences will offer me the honor of testing the hypotheses of this theory. I also welcome comments, suggestions and criticisms that will be considered to refine the theory and to improve its components in the forthcoming edition of the book.

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption: International Comparative Analysis* is a unique book in terms of the diversity of academic and intellectual background of its contributors, the depth of analyses and the variety of methodologies. The book is a useful source for understanding the linkages of journalism and corruption

and provides a tool to help explain variations of corruption levels across cultures and over time. We hope the book to be an initial point for further debates on how, when, why and what journalism can do to curb corruption in collaboration with political, economic, cultural, social and international structures.

The book is divided into two main parts including eleven chapters, nine of which Professor Basyouni Hamada has reviewed and edited (Chapters 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 10). Professor Saodah Wok has reviewed and edited two chapters (Chapters 9 and 11).

We thank all contributors for their inputs and analyses. We would also like to thank Mr. Edi Lipović from IntechOpen who did an exceptional job during the journey of this book's completion.

On a personal note, Hamada thanks his awesome wife Amal Hamada for her endless patience and support. Saodah thanks Dr. Shafizan Mohamed who helped her at the initial stages by reviewing and selecting chapters for publication.

#### **Basyouni Ibrahim Hamada (Editor)**

Professor, Department of Mass Communication, Qatar University, Qatar

**V**

[1] Hamada BI, Abdel-Salam A-SG, Elkilany EA. Press freedom and corruption: An examination of the relationship. Global Media and

[10] Vadlamannati KC, Cooray A. Transparency pays? evaluating the effects of the freedom of information laws on perceived government

Studies. 2016:1-22

corruption. The Journal of Development

[2] Cordis AS. Judicial checks on

[3] Glaeser EL, Saks RE. Corruption in America. Journal of Public Economics.

[4] Oberoi R. Mapping the matrix of corruption: Tracking the empirical evidences and tailoring responses. Journal of Asian and African Studies.

Communication; 2019

2006;**90**(6-7):1053-1072

2014;**49**(2):187-214

2005;**46**(4):327-345

[5] Qizilbash M. Two views of

democracy, economic freedom, and state strength: A cross-national analysis. London, Thousand Oaks, CA, New Delhi: Sage Publications;

[7] Tanzi V. Corruption around the world: Causes, consequences, scope, and cures. Abed GT, Gupta S, editors. In: Governance, Corruption and Economic Performance. Washington, DC: International Monetary Fund; 2002

[8] Treisman D. What have we learned about the causes of corruption from ten years of cross-national empirical research? Annual Review of Political

Science. 2007;**10**(1):211-244

[9] Treisman D. The causes of corruption: A cross-national study. Journal of Public Economics.

2000;**76**:399-457

corruption and democracy. Review of Political Economy. 2008;**20**(2):275-291

[6] Shen C, Williamson JB. Corruption,

corruption; 2008

**References**

**Saodah Wok (Co-Editor)** Professor, Department of Communication, International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM), Malaysia

#### **References**

[1] Hamada BI, Abdel-Salam A-SG, Elkilany EA. Press freedom and corruption: An examination of the relationship. Global Media and Communication; 2019

[2] Cordis AS. Judicial checks on corruption; 2008

[3] Glaeser EL, Saks RE. Corruption in America. Journal of Public Economics. 2006;**90**(6-7):1053-1072

[4] Oberoi R. Mapping the matrix of corruption: Tracking the empirical evidences and tailoring responses. Journal of Asian and African Studies. 2014;**49**(2):187-214

[5] Qizilbash M. Two views of corruption and democracy. Review of Political Economy. 2008;**20**(2):275-291

[6] Shen C, Williamson JB. Corruption, democracy, economic freedom, and state strength: A cross-national analysis. London, Thousand Oaks, CA, New Delhi: Sage Publications; 2005;**46**(4):327-345

[7] Tanzi V. Corruption around the world: Causes, consequences, scope, and cures. Abed GT, Gupta S, editors. In: Governance, Corruption and Economic Performance. Washington, DC: International Monetary Fund; 2002

[8] Treisman D. What have we learned about the causes of corruption from ten years of cross-national empirical research? Annual Review of Political Science. 2007;**10**(1):211-244

[9] Treisman D. The causes of corruption: A cross-national study. Journal of Public Economics. 2000;**76**:399-457

[10] Vadlamannati KC, Cooray A. Transparency pays? evaluating the effects of the freedom of information laws on perceived government corruption. The Journal of Development Studies. 2016:1-22

**1**

Section 1

Journalism and

Corruption - Theory

and Research

Section 1

Journalism and Corruption - Theory and Research

**3**

**1. Introduction**

**Chapter 1**

**Abstract**

Journalism and Corruption:

Theory of Determinants

*Basyouni Ibrahim Hamada*

Toward a Hierarchical Universal

Journalism is thought by many scholars to have an immense effect in controlling corruption. However, they do not know the conditions under which its performance brings about positive results in some countries while serving to protect corrupt policies and corrupt policy makers in some other countries. Journalism combats corruption through its content, freedom, structure, independence, ownership patterns, diversity, ethics, and professionalism, all of which demonstrate significant variations across cultures and nations. As a social institution, journalism does not work in a vacuum. Its impact is heavily determined by a variety of interacting variables characterizing both the nation system and international system in which it operates. The purpose of this chapter is to develop a hierarchical universal theory of journalism-corruption determinants. The theory perceives corruption act as an outcome of a continuous interaction between five hierarchical levels. They are: (1) journalistic level, (2) economic level, (3) political level, (4) cultural level, and (5) international system level. In general, each level has many sublevels interacting with each other to bring about an effect on corruption that could be negative or positive, minor or major, and finally in one domain or multiple domains. The suggested theory is based on a critically assessment revision of the current literature in several disciplines. The ultimate purpose is to create linkages capable to explain corruption,

predict it, direct the future studies, and finally contribute to reducing it.

corruption perception index, political corruption

**Keywords:** journalism and corruption fighting, hierarchical theory of determinants, press freedom, investigative journalism, watchdog journalism, media ownership, democracy, media diversity, international double standards, economic development,

Research on journalism and corruption has proliferated in the past two decades,

but it is largely unconnected and its conceptual and theoretical framework is far from complete. As such, upcoming research will be of little value in either understanding corruption or curbing its consequences. Corruption is a universal global problem with detrimental effects on economic growth and performance [1], political stability, and societal integration [1–3]. Despite the dominant satisfaction of the correlation between a large set of variables and corruption, controversial results seem to be quite common due to differences in definitions [4, 5], sources [6],

#### **Chapter 1**

## Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants

*Basyouni Ibrahim Hamada*

#### **Abstract**

Journalism is thought by many scholars to have an immense effect in controlling corruption. However, they do not know the conditions under which its performance brings about positive results in some countries while serving to protect corrupt policies and corrupt policy makers in some other countries. Journalism combats corruption through its content, freedom, structure, independence, ownership patterns, diversity, ethics, and professionalism, all of which demonstrate significant variations across cultures and nations. As a social institution, journalism does not work in a vacuum. Its impact is heavily determined by a variety of interacting variables characterizing both the nation system and international system in which it operates. The purpose of this chapter is to develop a hierarchical universal theory of journalism-corruption determinants. The theory perceives corruption act as an outcome of a continuous interaction between five hierarchical levels. They are: (1) journalistic level, (2) economic level, (3) political level, (4) cultural level, and (5) international system level. In general, each level has many sublevels interacting with each other to bring about an effect on corruption that could be negative or positive, minor or major, and finally in one domain or multiple domains. The suggested theory is based on a critically assessment revision of the current literature in several disciplines. The ultimate purpose is to create linkages capable to explain corruption, predict it, direct the future studies, and finally contribute to reducing it.

**Keywords:** journalism and corruption fighting, hierarchical theory of determinants, press freedom, investigative journalism, watchdog journalism, media ownership, democracy, media diversity, international double standards, economic development, corruption perception index, political corruption

#### **1. Introduction**

Research on journalism and corruption has proliferated in the past two decades, but it is largely unconnected and its conceptual and theoretical framework is far from complete. As such, upcoming research will be of little value in either understanding corruption or curbing its consequences. Corruption is a universal global problem with detrimental effects on economic growth and performance [1], political stability, and societal integration [1–3]. Despite the dominant satisfaction of the correlation between a large set of variables and corruption, controversial results seem to be quite common due to differences in definitions [4, 5], sources [6], measures, research designs, models, cultures, types of corruption control [7], and period of studies [6–9]. This general controversy is deeply applicable to the literature of journalism and corruption where several empirical and theoretical studies yield dramatically contradicting results. The existing literature lacks consensus on why it exists, its determinants, consequences, and more importantly, what makes it so differently widespread among cultures and countries [10].

In such a context, it would be important to develop a universal theory that embraces conceptual grounds of journalism and corruption. Yet, without considering the intricate interconnections between journalism and other related intervening variables of the higher socioeconomic levels/layers, such a theory would be misleading. Journalism is thought by many scholars to have an immense effect in controlling corruption. However, they do not know the conditions under which its performance brings about positive results in some countries while serving to protect corrupt policies and corrupt policy makers in some other countries. Journalism combats corruption through its content, freedom, structure, independence, ownership patterns, diversity, ethics, and professionalism, all of which demonstrate significant variations across cultures and nations. As a social institution, journalism does not work in a vacuum; its impact is heavily determined by both the nation system and international system environments in which it operates [11–13].

A multidisciplinary method, I argue, is the most appropriate approach to synthesize the key variables and underlying relationships across a set of published studies in a variety of disciplines to arrive at a theory of journalism-corruption determinants. A theory that discusses how multiple levels of determinants might be linked, or at least juxtaposed to yield a more comprehensive understanding of causes, and consequences of corruption and that can lead to more effective policy reforms. What I intend to do is to examine and move a body of knowledge forward to understand, interpret, predict, and finally help control the penetration of the most dangerous ill humanity has experienced since its establishment. The worst aspect about corruption is the nature of corruption itself. It takes so many different forms and covers such a variety of public and private activities that often is difficult for the common man or accountability agencies to detect what it really is. The corrupt officials are efficient at disguising their behaviors and covering over any traces. Moreover, it is very contagious. Corruption in one sphere of public or private domain quickly spreads to and penetrates in another like wildfire [14].

Corruption is an undeserved, unfair, unjust, immoral benefit resulting from positions of public trust and responsibility used for unworthy behaviors. It violates any notion of public responsibility on which the construction of democracy is built [14]. Despite the fact that corruption reality is compacted, complicated, diffused, and penetrated among all sectors and layers of the society, studies are often designed and carried out independently [15]. What complicates corruption research is that its causes in one discipline or level of analysis could be examined as a consequence in other discipline or level of analysis [8]. The single act of corruption within a small or big public or private corporation could be traced through several determinants within the corporation itself, the constitutional and legal system, structure of the economy, politics, culture, rule of law, in addition to historical roots of a given country in relation to colonialism, among many other factors and forces.

The suggested theory, then, will be designed in hierarchical levels in which the upper level, the macro level, is supposed to influence the lower level and so on. As Shoemaker and Rees argue, the hierarchy of influences model is useful for research in two important respects. First, any single perspective does not offer a comprehensive view, which is possible only when all levels affecting the variables under study are considered. Massive studies are conducted at a specific level, but findings are explained at higher levels. Second, merging multiple hierarchal levels of analysis

**5**

**2. What is corruption?**

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants*

useful to identify the phenomenon with which I am concerned.

Corruption as dependent variable here implies that things, behaviors, and policies are not what they ought to be. They have been deviant from the normal and expected paths. In the process of so deviating, the corrupt have unfairly and intentionally gained in some way that should not have happened or would not otherwise have occurred at the expense of everyone else, who, significantly, have thereby been disadvantaged

provide distinct explanations and direct the attention to the interplay between them [16]. In addition, as most of corruption behaviors occur within the transaction process between actors at different systems within and sometimes outside a given country, the multiple hierarchal levels of study is, perhaps, the only suitable method that detects different causes behind the illegal behaviors. The suggested theory is in line with what many authors believe about corruption. Political corruption, for example, is rooted in the social structure. The state of willingness for political corruption depends less on the psychological or personality characteristics of the individual public servant, and more on the socioeconomic environment and institutional context in which the state and the market are constructed. Furthermore, readiness for corruption is not constant in a public official, and can actually vary over time within the same person depending on the context he/she is found [17]. Literature on corruption is mainly divided between research that emphasizes either the influence of structure (determinism), or the influence of agency (freedom), on human thought processes and behaviors. While agency stands for the capacity of an individual to freely make his/her own independent choice, structure refers to factors such as economy, institution, religion, history, social class, and culture that influence the choices of an individual [18]. The rational choice theory represents the foundation for studies adopting the influence of agency. The unit of analysis is the individual who chooses a specific course of action on a short term as a rational action to satisfy his/her self-interest. Though this school of thought provides good reasons to study the motivation behind the corruption behavior of public officials, it has its own limitations that make it unsuitable to explain the complexities of this behavior (for more details on the limitations of the rational choice theory, see Monroe, 1991) [19]. Therefore, scholars have turned to the structural factors to overcome the shortcoming of the individual-based theory of corruption. My approach is also informed by the argument made by Michael Johnston in his book: Syndromes of Corruption: Wealth, Power, and Democracy. He outstandingly criticizes the current corruption literature that either adopts cross-sectional analytical traditions often applying statistical measures and models to large numbers of countries or the case studies that focus the investigation on specific context. The two approaches have their limits that never allows to appropriate understanding of corruption. Johnston, instead, suggests a middle level of comparison—one that does not deny the benefits of these two traditions but links them together [20]. My conviction is that no one approach holds all advantages, and that every approach has its own limitations and shortcomings that require a combination of multi-systems/layers interactive approach. Corruption is extremely entrenched in the basic historical, political, and cultural structures. This approach is in line with a growing body of historical institutionalism stressing the importance of moving away from examining corruption as individualistic behavior to focus on the informal rules and routines that enforce individuals to act according to these norms [21, 22]. Historical institutionalism, in general, is an analytical approach that pays attention to the ways by which institutions shape and structure behaviors [23]. At this point, it would be

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

#### *Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

provide distinct explanations and direct the attention to the interplay between them [16]. In addition, as most of corruption behaviors occur within the transaction process between actors at different systems within and sometimes outside a given country, the multiple hierarchal levels of study is, perhaps, the only suitable method that detects different causes behind the illegal behaviors. The suggested theory is in line with what many authors believe about corruption. Political corruption, for example, is rooted in the social structure. The state of willingness for political corruption depends less on the psychological or personality characteristics of the individual public servant, and more on the socioeconomic environment and institutional context in which the state and the market are constructed. Furthermore, readiness for corruption is not constant in a public official, and can actually vary over time within the same person depending on the context he/she is found [17].

Literature on corruption is mainly divided between research that emphasizes either the influence of structure (determinism), or the influence of agency (freedom), on human thought processes and behaviors. While agency stands for the capacity of an individual to freely make his/her own independent choice, structure refers to factors such as economy, institution, religion, history, social class, and culture that influence the choices of an individual [18]. The rational choice theory represents the foundation for studies adopting the influence of agency. The unit of analysis is the individual who chooses a specific course of action on a short term as a rational action to satisfy his/her self-interest. Though this school of thought provides good reasons to study the motivation behind the corruption behavior of public officials, it has its own limitations that make it unsuitable to explain the complexities of this behavior (for more details on the limitations of the rational choice theory, see Monroe, 1991) [19]. Therefore, scholars have turned to the structural factors to overcome the shortcoming of the individual-based theory of corruption. My approach is also informed by the argument made by Michael Johnston in his book: Syndromes of Corruption: Wealth, Power, and Democracy. He outstandingly criticizes the current corruption literature that either adopts cross-sectional analytical traditions often applying statistical measures and models to large numbers of countries or the case studies that focus the investigation on specific context. The two approaches have their limits that never allows to appropriate understanding of corruption. Johnston, instead, suggests a middle level of comparison—one that does not deny the benefits of these two traditions but links them together [20]. My conviction is that no one approach holds all advantages, and that every approach has its own limitations and shortcomings that require a combination of multi-systems/layers interactive approach. Corruption is extremely entrenched in the basic historical, political, and cultural structures. This approach is in line with a growing body of historical institutionalism stressing the importance of moving away from examining corruption as individualistic behavior to focus on the informal rules and routines that enforce individuals to act according to these norms [21, 22]. Historical institutionalism, in general, is an analytical approach that pays attention to the ways by which institutions shape and structure behaviors [23]. At this point, it would be useful to identify the phenomenon with which I am concerned.

#### **2. What is corruption?**

Corruption as dependent variable here implies that things, behaviors, and policies are not what they ought to be. They have been deviant from the normal and expected paths. In the process of so deviating, the corrupt have unfairly and intentionally gained in some way that should not have happened or would not otherwise have occurred at the expense of everyone else, who, significantly, have thereby been disadvantaged

[14]. The existence of corruption requires three elements to simultaneously coexist: first, the powerful person who has a discretionally power; second, an economic rent linked to this authority; and third, low probability of detection by the judicial system [24]. Klitgaard presents an elegant understanding of the determinants of corruption that views it as the ultimate output of the interaction between three pillars: monopoly power, discretion, and accountability. Its existence requires little or no accountability mechanisms, and presence of both imperfect competitive markets and discretion [25]. The corrupt behavior may be either passive or active. That is when the law is not totally or partly imposed or when the public official intentionally applies it selectively and unfairly to favor some persons or some organizations over others in the transaction processes [26]. In a corrupt country, public resources are more likely directed toward protecting the elite of the corrupt regime—the armed forces, the police, the executives, and other cliques of social control—as the regime seeks to perpetuate its control. This is why corruption is usually defined as the criminal misuse of power. A corrupt individual occupies higher social, political, and economic status [27]. Given this fact, it is expected that corruption precludes the socioeconomic development expenditure and widens the gap between the rich and the poor population [28].

In this context, it would also be useful to distinguish between grand corruption on the one hand and petty corruption on the other. The first has been defined as the misuse of public power by heads of state, ministers, and senior officials for private financial gain [29]. The second refers to bribes citizens pay to lower level officials to speed the delivery of services or to fasten the appropriate guidelines [30]. Obviously, the huge and rapidly growing literature around corruption bears a conceptual bias when it confines it to public sector and defines it from a state perspective. Reviewing literature of the conceptual framework of this key term in economy, sociology, political science, and so forth ignores the reality of corruption in private sphere [31].

In most of cross-country comparative studies, corruption indices of Transparency International (TI) are used to measure and compare corruption. This is a composite index including many other sources. Some studies used data from other individual sources, that is, the Political Risk Service (PRS), the Institute for Management Development (IMD), the World Bank and University of Basel (WB/ UB), or the World Economic Forum (WEF). For a description of these sources, see Lambsdorff [32, 33]. An older source has been compiled by Business International [1]. In their studies on typology of corruption, Bussell [34] argued for not using one single shared typology across all analyses, as it is highly unlikely that a single typology will be sufficient for all research questions. Given the complex nature of corruption, they argued for a more practical, problem-driven approach. Corruption as Helman [35] argues is a derivative concept, meaning that it depends on a theory of the institution involved. In order to define corruption of an official or institution, one needs an explanation of how the official ought to behave or how the institution ought to function. Corruption can and is being measured through a wide variety of innovative approaches. It is appropriate to rely on a wide variety of different indicators, both subjective and objective, individual as well as aggregate, cross-country as well as country-specific. This is important to monitor results on the ground, assess the concrete reality of corruption, and develop anticorruption programs [2]. The variety of approaches through which corruption has to be defined and insufficiency of any or group of approaches may urge me to suggest a flexible definition for this phenomenon to mean what people perceive in a particular culture as corruption.

#### **3. Levels of analysis**

The levels of analysis in journalism-corruption determinants can be thought of as forming a continuum ranging from micro to macro, from the smallest units of

**7**

**Figure 1.**

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants*

a system to the largest. A micro level study examines corruption act as an activity practiced by an individual or a specific social institution occupies the lower level of the hierarchical influences. This could be a public official, a newspaper, or other journalism outlet that affects another firm or level. A macro level study examines social and political structures that exist in higher layers of the hierarchy. These levels operate hierarchically: What happens at the lower levels is determined by what occurs at higher levels to cause or deter the corruption behavior of an individual official or a particular system. For more details on how hierarchical levels of analysis work and guide research, see Shoemaker and Reese [16]. The rest of this chapter examines from several perspectives findings and explanations relating to determinants of corruption at different hierarchical levels. The main argument of "the hierarchical universal theory of journalism-corruption determinants" as introduced here perceives corruption act as an outcome of a continuous interaction between five hierarchical levels as shown in the graph below. They are: (1) journalistic level, (2) economic level, (3) political level, (4) cultural level, and (5) the international system level. In general, each level has many sublevels interacting with each other to bring about an effect on corruption that could be negative or positive, minor or major, and finally in one domain or multiple domains. It is understood also that the magnitude of lower level impact is weaker than that of the higher level. It is not expected, for example, that influence of journalism, as institution to be stronger

Given the discussions outlined in the preceding paragraphs, I will move through a sequence of four steps. The purpose of the first step is to identify the number and

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

than that of the political system or cultural system.

*The hierarchal universal theory of journalism/corruption determinants.*

#### *Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

a system to the largest. A micro level study examines corruption act as an activity practiced by an individual or a specific social institution occupies the lower level of the hierarchical influences. This could be a public official, a newspaper, or other journalism outlet that affects another firm or level. A macro level study examines social and political structures that exist in higher layers of the hierarchy. These levels operate hierarchically: What happens at the lower levels is determined by what occurs at higher levels to cause or deter the corruption behavior of an individual official or a particular system. For more details on how hierarchical levels of analysis work and guide research, see Shoemaker and Reese [16]. The rest of this chapter examines from several perspectives findings and explanations relating to determinants of corruption at different hierarchical levels. The main argument of "the hierarchical universal theory of journalism-corruption determinants" as introduced here perceives corruption act as an outcome of a continuous interaction between five hierarchical levels as shown in the graph below. They are: (1) journalistic level, (2) economic level, (3) political level, (4) cultural level, and (5) the international system level. In general, each level has many sublevels interacting with each other to bring about an effect on corruption that could be negative or positive, minor or major, and finally in one domain or multiple domains. It is understood also that the magnitude of lower level impact is weaker than that of the higher level. It is not expected, for example, that influence of journalism, as institution to be stronger than that of the political system or cultural system.

Given the discussions outlined in the preceding paragraphs, I will move through a sequence of four steps. The purpose of the first step is to identify the number and

domains of the interacting hierarchal levels—as shown earlier—that sustain and/or restrain corruption. The second step aims at reviewing the empirical and theoretical studies that examine the main relevant variables and issues. The purpose of the third step is to present the generalizations summarizing the main findings. The fourth step intends to synthesize the main cross-border assumptions; a theory that creates linkages capable to explain corruption, predict it, direct the future studies, and finally contribute to reducing it (**Figure 1**).

#### **4. Journalistic level**

At this first level of the hierarchal theory, the revision will confine to conditions and functions of journalism that have distinct implications for corruption determinants, consequences, and policy reforms. In theory, conditions are different from functions, they are the elements and characteristics that enable or disable journalism as a social institution in the fight against corruption. Freedom, independence, and diversity are the main conditions of journalism that empower it to perform the functions of (1) watchdog, (2) accountability, and (3) agenda-setter. These conditions and functions relate to the existence of corruption, its diffusion and control.

#### **5. Conditions**

A commonly held belief is that a free and independent press serves as deterrent to corruption due to its ability to detect corrupt behaviors and officials. A number of recent papers that consider the relationship between press freedom and corruption lend support to this conviction. Ahrend [36] finds that lower levels of press freedom are correlated with higher levels of corruption, a result that is supported by Chowdhury [37], Stapenhurst [38, 39], and Bojanic [40] who explained the positive effect of press freedom in the presence of democracy [40]. The overwhelming majority of empirical studies support the theoretical view that restrictions to press freedom lead to higher corruption and that political and economic restrictions are strongly and robustly related to corruption [41]. This view is totally supported in OPEC members where journalism was not serving as a check against corruption due to the restrictions imposed on its ownership and performance [42].

The most rigorous work in this respect is that of Brunetti and Weder [43] in which they use alternative measures for both the independent and dependent variables. They carry out several robustness checks utilizing two different press freedom indexes and four different measures of corruption, across countries as well as over time. The results show significant positive effects of press freedom on three of the four corruption control indices. Their results confirm the widely held belief that in countries where the press is mainly free from any sort of restrictions, corruption levels are likely to be low [43]. Though freedom of the press is a prerequisite to combat corruption, without citizens' access to and participation in press content, its impact would be at its minimum. The results of Dutta and Roy's study present empirical evidence that these two components of the press—freedom and access complement each other in controlling corruption [44].

In a different thread of research, Graber [45] demonstrates that the press often deserve less recognition than previously believed for detecting corruption. Similarly, Vaidya [46] indicates that the government-press relationship in different parts of the world appears to suggest a more complex relationship. It might not serve as a watchdog for the public but might prefer to enter in a partnership with corrupt officials. However, not all forms of restrictions to press freedom

**9**

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants*

its own has no or little impact to prevent or control corruption.

are strongly correlated with corruption. More specifically, it appears that it is the political pressures that have a slightly stronger effect on corruption [46]. Lindstedt and Naurin [47] contend that in order for transparency to alleviate corruption, the audience should receive the information made available through transparency and they must have the capacity to hold corrupt officials accountable. Transparency on

In this context, two competing views on the relation between perception of corruption and actual corruption deserve more elaboration. The first view sees that higher levels of corruption's perception led citizens to hold their governments accountable through democratic mechanisms and, specifically, the electoral process. This view hinges on the assumption that higher perception of corruption corresponds to a higher level of actual corruption, and that press is independent and the public uses its power to punish the government. Perception is a function of press coverage for corruption in real world and the role of the press will be to decrease it [48]. The second view implies that heightened perception of corruption can increase

its actual level by publicizing the view of corruption as a normal activity and therefore lower the threshold of inhibition for others to engage in the same kind of behavior. Proponents of this view argue that more perception of corruption threat-

ens state legitimacy and creates credibility and trust crises in the state [49].

In fact, existing literature as a whole emphasizes the significant impact of the free press as a highly effective mechanism of external control on corruption because it works not only against extortive but also against collusive corruption [43]. Extortive corruption as explained by Brunetti and Weder [43] happens when the government official has the discretionary power to refuse or delay a service in order to extract a rent from the private agent in the form of a bribe. The collusive corruption occurred when the official and the client have mutual interests and the two partners benefit from the transaction. Generally, press freedom is highly correlated with low levels of corruption, but its effectiveness is only related to collusive corruption [43]. Free press is a prerequisite for investigative journalism, which in turn is a fundamental mechanism contributing to both vertical and horizontal accountability. Journalism as institution would be of little value in curbing corruption unless it is free, independent, and plural. Leaders of international economic bodies such as the World Bank have paid attention to the importance of press freedom as the core of the equitable development [50]. This positive attitude has coincided with publication of several articles that demonstrate a strong correlation between a free press and low corruption levels across countries [50]. Ahrend [50], for example, provides a strong empirical evidence indicating that causation runs mainly from lower levels of press

The free press investigates wrongdoing, feeds the public sphere with the consequences of corruption behaviors and forms public opinion. This emphatically pressures the governmental bodies especially the judiciary to hold corrupt officials accountable [51]. As a result, in democratic countries, corrupt officials are forced to resign and lose their power. This significant role takes place where a combination of free press, democracy, and rule of law exists. Evidence on such a collaborative role is presented by Hamada, Abdel-Salam, and Elkilany who find that the interaction of press freedom, democracy, and rule of law reduces corruption. Furthermore, they obtain that the effect of rule of law is not contingent on freedom of the press; rule of law affects corruption both in countries where the press is free and where it is unfree [52]. In a similar vein, Besley and Prat [53] test and verify their model, which links a number of characteristics of journalism industry, namely concentration and ownership and obvious political outcomes, namely capture, corruption, and turnover. The model is based on three propositions: (1) media pluralism works against capture, (2) independent ownership minimizes capture, and (3) media capture lessens political

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

freedom to higher levels of corruption.

#### *Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

are strongly correlated with corruption. More specifically, it appears that it is the political pressures that have a slightly stronger effect on corruption [46]. Lindstedt and Naurin [47] contend that in order for transparency to alleviate corruption, the audience should receive the information made available through transparency and they must have the capacity to hold corrupt officials accountable. Transparency on its own has no or little impact to prevent or control corruption.

In this context, two competing views on the relation between perception of corruption and actual corruption deserve more elaboration. The first view sees that higher levels of corruption's perception led citizens to hold their governments accountable through democratic mechanisms and, specifically, the electoral process. This view hinges on the assumption that higher perception of corruption corresponds to a higher level of actual corruption, and that press is independent and the public uses its power to punish the government. Perception is a function of press coverage for corruption in real world and the role of the press will be to decrease it [48]. The second view implies that heightened perception of corruption can increase its actual level by publicizing the view of corruption as a normal activity and therefore lower the threshold of inhibition for others to engage in the same kind of behavior. Proponents of this view argue that more perception of corruption threatens state legitimacy and creates credibility and trust crises in the state [49].

In fact, existing literature as a whole emphasizes the significant impact of the free press as a highly effective mechanism of external control on corruption because it works not only against extortive but also against collusive corruption [43]. Extortive corruption as explained by Brunetti and Weder [43] happens when the government official has the discretionary power to refuse or delay a service in order to extract a rent from the private agent in the form of a bribe. The collusive corruption occurred when the official and the client have mutual interests and the two partners benefit from the transaction. Generally, press freedom is highly correlated with low levels of corruption, but its effectiveness is only related to collusive corruption [43]. Free press is a prerequisite for investigative journalism, which in turn is a fundamental mechanism contributing to both vertical and horizontal accountability. Journalism as institution would be of little value in curbing corruption unless it is free, independent, and plural. Leaders of international economic bodies such as the World Bank have paid attention to the importance of press freedom as the core of the equitable development [50]. This positive attitude has coincided with publication of several articles that demonstrate a strong correlation between a free press and low corruption levels across countries [50]. Ahrend [50], for example, provides a strong empirical evidence indicating that causation runs mainly from lower levels of press freedom to higher levels of corruption.

The free press investigates wrongdoing, feeds the public sphere with the consequences of corruption behaviors and forms public opinion. This emphatically pressures the governmental bodies especially the judiciary to hold corrupt officials accountable [51]. As a result, in democratic countries, corrupt officials are forced to resign and lose their power. This significant role takes place where a combination of free press, democracy, and rule of law exists. Evidence on such a collaborative role is presented by Hamada, Abdel-Salam, and Elkilany who find that the interaction of press freedom, democracy, and rule of law reduces corruption. Furthermore, they obtain that the effect of rule of law is not contingent on freedom of the press; rule of law affects corruption both in countries where the press is free and where it is unfree [52]. In a similar vein, Besley and Prat [53] test and verify their model, which links a number of characteristics of journalism industry, namely concentration and ownership and obvious political outcomes, namely capture, corruption, and turnover. The model is based on three propositions: (1) media pluralism works against capture, (2) independent ownership minimizes capture, and (3) media capture lessens political

outcomes. They conclude that laws of press freedom are not sufficient to protect journalism from government interference. Consistent with this, Djankov finds that countries with greater state ownership of the press have less freedom, fewer political rights for citizens, inferior governance, and less developed capital markets [54]. In general, press freedom and democratization have a symbiotic relationship. Both go hand in hand, and where democracy exists, press assumes its free and critical evaluation of wrongdoing and vice versa. What is not clearly known is the conditions under which these two close variables interact. Historically, a free press requires its independence from the state and the private sector, a kind of independence that enables it to act as an indirect check on corruption that would otherwise flourish in the absence of competitive environment. By creating a diversified atmosphere absorbing different views and enriching a free public debate, journalism sustains political and economic competition, the necessary condition for a clean economic and political environment with a minimum level of corruption [38].

#### **6. Functions**

It has long been recognized that journalism plays a key role in curbing corruption. This is because of its fundamental role in enabling citizens to monitor the actions of the government officials. This, in turn, rationalizes the voting behavior of the citizens to the extent that they can punish the corrupt and unresponsive governments. Literature offers two models linking journalism to corruption. The first has been developed by Stromberg [55] focusing on the impact of journalism on policy issues including corruption. The main concept of the model implies that when voters are deprived from free flow of journalism information, they are not likely informed citizens, and the government is more likely to allocate resources that do not serve the interest of people. It also sets policies that are associated with higher rents and corruption [55].

Besley and Prat [53] present the second model in which voters who have been informed by a free press can vote corrupt officials out of office, but where, at the same time, corrupt politicians can capture and silence the press. The latter deprives citizens of any possibility to form an enlightened voting, and hence increases the likelihood for corrupt government officials to continue in office. The model is in line with a long tradition of many political thinkers including Rousseau, Smith, Hobbes, Locke, Madison, Jefferson, and Mill who have argued that press freedom is a prerequisite for citizens to make rational and knowledgeable decisions about public affairs [8]. Regardless of these two models, there are two ways through which journalism fights corruption: tangible and intangible. The first role is apparent when public office-holders are accused, or forced to resign after their crimes are exposed to public space. Investigative journalism that defends social and ethical norms, and intensifies competition, works as an indirect check against corruption [38]. Unlike legislative, executive, and judicial bodies, journalism, as a fourth estate, has no specific means to sanction mismanagement of public officials [56]. Corruption flourishes in the presence of cooperation among horizontal institutions of the state. The independent press can replace cooperation by disputes when it highlights corruption behaviors and thus create unfavorable atmosphere that eradicates corruption [38]. Through the watchdog function of journalism, three patterns of policy effects are generated: The first occurs when the government bodies discuss the problems raised by the press and take the procedures to present solutions. The second takes place if sanctions are applied against persons or institutions as a result of corruption or wrongdoing. The third happens when the parliament made changes in laws and legislations as a response to the investigate reports [57].

**11**

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants*

governance lies in its ability to sustain political accountability [64].

If free press pressures public officials to be answerable for their behavior, forces them to justify their actions publically, and informs the citizenry about such investigations, then it necessarily contributes to holding them accountable [64]. This happens through either its original informational role in which it identifies corruption acts and initiates the investigations or through a subsidy informational role in which it republishes the facts and information provided by other traditional intermediaries [65]. By the original and secondary informational roles, press contributes to horizontal and vertical accountability [64]. The problem arises when the public in many countries lacks interest in politics and motivation to participate in elections. Here, the free press' role is to hold the governors accountable—not to the public, but to the ideals and rules of the democratic polity itself [66]. This is particularly important given the fact that accountability mechanisms are fragile in many countries [67].

In such countries, social media provide an alternative that triggers accountability

mechanisms in a large state-controlled press, limited political competition and censorship of traditional media [68]. Yet, social media role has to be accompanied by users' interest in acquiring knowledge about corruption, their skills to process it adequately, and their motivation to participate in actions to change the corrupt behaviors [69]. Social media have tremendous power in turning public officials into symbols of wrongdoing, regardless of legal judgment and sanctions [67]. The preceding discussion shows that the mere existence of journalism does not mean anything unless it has access to sources of information and the ability to enlighten the public with what went wrong [70]. By doing so, press coverage influences norms, values, and cultures, which in turn can lead to transformation in politics, economy, and governance [71]. This cultural change happens over time as a cumulative effect of continuous coverage of the press and through the cultivation of new standards of behaviors. Press is a crucial actor in the process of changing norms toward more transparency and accountability. By changing perceptions of what is

The critical role of investigative journalism takes place when it exposes the government's record to external scrutiny and critical evaluation, and holds authorities accountable for their actions [58]. Several studies offered empirical evidence [43] that watchdog role of journalists enhances the transparency of government actions and decisions, hinders misuse of public office, malfeasance, and thus reduces corruption [43, 58]. As Bovens argues, public accountability is a relationship between an actor and a forum, in which the actor has an obligation to explain and to justify his or her conduct, the forum can pose questions and pass judgment, and the actor may face consequences [59]. Traditionally, theorists of public accountability assume that governmental accountability incorporates a combination of vertical and horizontal institutions [60]. Vertical accountability describes a relationship between unequals where powerful superior actors hold less powerful inferior actors accountable or vice versa [61]. Forms of this type of accountability include electoral accountability, civil society, and journalism. Enlighted voter participation can punish the corrupt officials and replace the incumbent by electing a new government. The free press empowers voters and makes them aware of the corrupt behaviors and incumbents. As a result, they become more knowledgeable and their ability to hold elected officials accountable for their policy decisions enhanced. A variety of models also confirm the fact that policy distortion is a result of ill-informed citizens [62]. Horizontal accountability implies the power of checks and balances exercised by equals [60] where the three authorities of state-executive, legislative, and judiciary monitor each other. As an empirical investigation of this issue, Camaj [63] found that the free press has a greater indirect effect on corruption when coupled with strong institutions of horizontal accountability than when coupled with high electoral accountability. The main contribution of the free press to democratic

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

#### *Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

The critical role of investigative journalism takes place when it exposes the government's record to external scrutiny and critical evaluation, and holds authorities accountable for their actions [58]. Several studies offered empirical evidence [43] that watchdog role of journalists enhances the transparency of government actions and decisions, hinders misuse of public office, malfeasance, and thus reduces corruption [43, 58]. As Bovens argues, public accountability is a relationship between an actor and a forum, in which the actor has an obligation to explain and to justify his or her conduct, the forum can pose questions and pass judgment, and the actor may face consequences [59]. Traditionally, theorists of public accountability assume that governmental accountability incorporates a combination of vertical and horizontal institutions [60]. Vertical accountability describes a relationship between unequals where powerful superior actors hold less powerful inferior actors accountable or vice versa [61]. Forms of this type of accountability include electoral accountability, civil society, and journalism. Enlighted voter participation can punish the corrupt officials and replace the incumbent by electing a new government. The free press empowers voters and makes them aware of the corrupt behaviors and incumbents. As a result, they become more knowledgeable and their ability to hold elected officials accountable for their policy decisions enhanced. A variety of models also confirm the fact that policy distortion is a result of ill-informed citizens [62]. Horizontal accountability implies the power of checks and balances exercised by equals [60] where the three authorities of state-executive, legislative, and judiciary monitor each other. As an empirical investigation of this issue, Camaj [63] found that the free press has a greater indirect effect on corruption when coupled with strong institutions of horizontal accountability than when coupled with high electoral accountability. The main contribution of the free press to democratic governance lies in its ability to sustain political accountability [64].

If free press pressures public officials to be answerable for their behavior, forces them to justify their actions publically, and informs the citizenry about such investigations, then it necessarily contributes to holding them accountable [64]. This happens through either its original informational role in which it identifies corruption acts and initiates the investigations or through a subsidy informational role in which it republishes the facts and information provided by other traditional intermediaries [65]. By the original and secondary informational roles, press contributes to horizontal and vertical accountability [64]. The problem arises when the public in many countries lacks interest in politics and motivation to participate in elections. Here, the free press' role is to hold the governors accountable—not to the public, but to the ideals and rules of the democratic polity itself [66]. This is particularly important given the fact that accountability mechanisms are fragile in many countries [67].

In such countries, social media provide an alternative that triggers accountability mechanisms in a large state-controlled press, limited political competition and censorship of traditional media [68]. Yet, social media role has to be accompanied by users' interest in acquiring knowledge about corruption, their skills to process it adequately, and their motivation to participate in actions to change the corrupt behaviors [69]. Social media have tremendous power in turning public officials into symbols of wrongdoing, regardless of legal judgment and sanctions [67]. The preceding discussion shows that the mere existence of journalism does not mean anything unless it has access to sources of information and the ability to enlighten the public with what went wrong [70]. By doing so, press coverage influences norms, values, and cultures, which in turn can lead to transformation in politics, economy, and governance [71]. This cultural change happens over time as a cumulative effect of continuous coverage of the press and through the cultivation of new standards of behaviors. Press is a crucial actor in the process of changing norms toward more transparency and accountability. By changing perceptions of what is

right and wrong, the press can lead to less or zero tolerance for corruption [71]. On the other hand, if journalism complies with the power of corrupt officials, ignores their intended failure and mismanagement, a culture of corruption tolerance prevails and it will be socially acceptable [72].

### **6.1 Generalizations**


**13**

gradually [81].

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants*

To a great extent, the level of corruption is an outcome of the degree of both monopoly and discretionary power that officials exercise. The two types of monopolies exist in highly regulated economies and definitely in developing countries where administrative rules and regulations are mainly imperfectly defined and overwhelmed by a weak rule of law. Corruption environment is also characterized by ineffective accountability and weak watchdog mechanisms. Empirically, more discretionary power and regulations equal more corruption [73]. Hence, effective strategies to control corruption have to simultaneously work on reducing officials' monopoly power, their discretionary power, and strengthening their accountability through enabling the watchdog mechanisms [38]. Prior studies provide evidence that competitive economies are less corrupt than economies where domestic firms are protected from foreign competition. The results suggest that the policies aiming at making markets more competitive could play a role in controlling corruption [74]. This approach to corruption control suggests that increasing competition may be a way to reduce returns from corruption activities. Yet this argument is over simple as economists still have not fully identified the conditions under which an increase in competition will effectively

In a similar thread of research, public choice theorists argue that corruption rates are directly corresponding to the degree of monopoly that public office officials have over a specific bureaucratic sphere. In contrast, a negative relationship exists between accountability they bear and the rate of corruption [76]. Since officials in autocracies have monopoly power and discretionary power without any form of accountability, the risk of punishment associated with corruption is often zero [77]. However, consolidated autocracy differs from lenient autocratic governance as it applies rigid regulations that raise the cost of corruption practices to the

In a different line of research, democracy and economic freedom prove to be real determinants of corruption. Meanwhile, there is not enough knowledge about how the interaction effect between democracy and economic freedom occurs or under which conditions the interaction represents a cure for corruption. Countries such as Hong Kong and Singapore exhibit a very low level of democracy and a very high level of economic freedom and at the same time have a very low level of corruption. On the other hand, in spite of India's high level of democracy and low level of economic freedom, it experiences a very high level of corruption. Thus, it is of interest to ask how these two factors, that is, democracy and economic freedom work together in this process [79]. The answer to this question comes from the investigation of Saha and Gounder who found that the interaction effect of democracy and economic freedom has a significant impact on controlling corruption. But the relationship is complex; democracy increases corruption at lower levels of economic freedom, yet in a full mature democracy, corruption is significantly lower [80]. This is consistent with other studies indicating that corruption control is more likely if an economic development is attained first, with democracy following more

Any discussion of economic determinants of corruption has to answer the questions of privatization, public sector wages, government regulations, democracy, and level of economic development. Privatization may have its clear economic advantages, but unfortunately, its impact on corruption is unclear. What happens is the shift of corruption from the public to the private sector. What was formerly taken from state-owned enterprises can then be extorted from private firms. Surely, the public sector corruption is certainly higher, for many reasons, than the private sector. At the top of these reasons is the wages where low public sector wages stimulate corruption among public sector

extent that illegal bureaucratic corruption is often minimal [78].

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

**7. The economic level**

reduce corruption [75].

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

#### **7. The economic level**

To a great extent, the level of corruption is an outcome of the degree of both monopoly and discretionary power that officials exercise. The two types of monopolies exist in highly regulated economies and definitely in developing countries where administrative rules and regulations are mainly imperfectly defined and overwhelmed by a weak rule of law. Corruption environment is also characterized by ineffective accountability and weak watchdog mechanisms. Empirically, more discretionary power and regulations equal more corruption [73]. Hence, effective strategies to control corruption have to simultaneously work on reducing officials' monopoly power, their discretionary power, and strengthening their accountability through enabling the watchdog mechanisms [38]. Prior studies provide evidence that competitive economies are less corrupt than economies where domestic firms are protected from foreign competition. The results suggest that the policies aiming at making markets more competitive could play a role in controlling corruption [74]. This approach to corruption control suggests that increasing competition may be a way to reduce returns from corruption activities. Yet this argument is over simple as economists still have not fully identified the conditions under which an increase in competition will effectively reduce corruption [75].

In a similar thread of research, public choice theorists argue that corruption rates are directly corresponding to the degree of monopoly that public office officials have over a specific bureaucratic sphere. In contrast, a negative relationship exists between accountability they bear and the rate of corruption [76]. Since officials in autocracies have monopoly power and discretionary power without any form of accountability, the risk of punishment associated with corruption is often zero [77]. However, consolidated autocracy differs from lenient autocratic governance as it applies rigid regulations that raise the cost of corruption practices to the extent that illegal bureaucratic corruption is often minimal [78].

In a different line of research, democracy and economic freedom prove to be real determinants of corruption. Meanwhile, there is not enough knowledge about how the interaction effect between democracy and economic freedom occurs or under which conditions the interaction represents a cure for corruption. Countries such as Hong Kong and Singapore exhibit a very low level of democracy and a very high level of economic freedom and at the same time have a very low level of corruption. On the other hand, in spite of India's high level of democracy and low level of economic freedom, it experiences a very high level of corruption. Thus, it is of interest to ask how these two factors, that is, democracy and economic freedom work together in this process [79]. The answer to this question comes from the investigation of Saha and Gounder who found that the interaction effect of democracy and economic freedom has a significant impact on controlling corruption. But the relationship is complex; democracy increases corruption at lower levels of economic freedom, yet in a full mature democracy, corruption is significantly lower [80]. This is consistent with other studies indicating that corruption control is more likely if an economic development is attained first, with democracy following more gradually [81].

Any discussion of economic determinants of corruption has to answer the questions of privatization, public sector wages, government regulations, democracy, and level of economic development. Privatization may have its clear economic advantages, but unfortunately, its impact on corruption is unclear. What happens is the shift of corruption from the public to the private sector. What was formerly taken from state-owned enterprises can then be extorted from private firms. Surely, the public sector corruption is certainly higher, for many reasons, than the private sector. At the top of these reasons is the wages where low public sector wages stimulate corruption among public sector

workers [82]. By the same token, it is likely that corruption correlates positively with the degree to which government regulations are vague and lax [83]. In contrast, Treisman found corruption is lower in economically developed well-established liberal democracies, with a free press, and a high quota of women in governmental institutions, and an open and competitive global trade history [84]. The logical question here is under what conditions this result takes place. Does economic development reduce corruption? Alternatively, does corruption impede economic development? To what extent are both determined by some other factors? The general verified finding illustrates that when countries grow rich, they become less corrupt [85]. In other words, corruption is significantly correlated with the level of economic development (1999), a condition that makes policy reforms unmanageable. A country cannot wait forever to attain the economic development in order to control corruption [86].

The preceding debate tells us that differential effect of corruption is a neglected topic. For example, China has been able to grow faster than so many countries while being ranked among the most corrupt countries. Why corruption is less dangerous in China? Or would China have grown even faster if corruption was lower? These kinds of questions have received scant attention and need more investigations [87]. The same debate has to be raised with regard to democracy-corruption relationship and to any other variable that is likely to affect corruption or be affected by it directly or indirectly. A more common and relevant predictor of corruption is the size of the government and state legitimacy. Bigger and illegitimate governments allow more bureaucracies and less legislative oversight and more corruption [26, 88]. Nevertheless, it is not only the size of the government that explains the level of corruption but also whether the big government is democratic. The big size of government reduces corruption if democratic values and institutions prevail. In contrast, it expands corruption if it is undemocratic [89].

#### **7.1 Generalizations**


**15**

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants*

tion, consolidated autocracy tends to deter corruption.

9.The big size of the government does not lead directly to corruption; the relationship is strongly affected by existence of democracy that marginalizes the

10.The link between autocratic systems and corruption is complex, where tolerant autocratic governments create favorite conditions for bureaucratic corrup-

11.The widely accepted definition of corruption as the abuse of public office for private gains reflects an ideological bias against state activity where national private sectors and global private business experience corruption as well.

I will discuss the prior literature of political level—similar to other levels—along

two parallel tracks: the political theoretical frameworks of corruption and the empirical findings of political cross-national comparative studies. Both tracks will be simultaneously presented in a way that contributes to building the hierarchical universal theory of journalism/corruption determinants. Obviously, the most commonly examined political issue is democracy and democratization where the available evidences tentatively indicate the association between higher political competitiveness, democracy, and lower level of corruption; however, this effect is not linear. Some authoritarian countries actually experience slightly less corruption than countries at intermediate levels of democracy. Even authoritarian regimes do not have similar effect with regard to corruption behavior. Dictatorial regimes are

significantly more corrupt than single-party and military regimes [90].

redesign the balance of power in favor of fighting corruption [140].

The overall result accordingly suggests a failure of the conceptual association posed between democracy and the reduction of corruption [95]. Yet, there exists a complementarity effect of democracy and press freedom. Democratic institutions

Following the transitional phase where countries enjoy more political competitiveness, they tend to be less corrupt [74]. The general idea is that partial, young democracies or countries that experience the transition to consolidated democracy perform worse than authoritarian regimes and much worse than full or older democracies [37, 91]. In support of this ideal view, Montinola and Jackman provide evidence that moderate levels of democracy do not reduce corruption if compared to autocratic regimes. After the transition period to democracy ends, democratic practices do curb corruption [10]. Consistent with this evidence, Ensung suggests that democracy in general decreases corruption with the exception of the early stages of the political liberalization that witnesses higher levels of corruption. His explanation assumes that it is the societal indicators of each society that determine how much democratic reforms can curb corruption [92]. In parallel, with these studies and results, political parties and its strength were also found to be deterring mechanisms. But, corruption prevails in the transition toward modernization where political parties are absent or have no influence on the public involvement in political decision-making [93]. In general, political parties have been found to be behind the prevalence and spreading of corruption as they may reduce the risks of corruption acts [94]. From a political point of view, what influences corruption is not only democracy-related issues, but the overall social, political, and judicial institutions of a given country [20]. Corruption is no more than a contest between those who benefit and those who lose from this illegal and abnormal practices. These two partners reflect the socioeconomic structure in any society. Political changes, therefore, do not curb corruption unless they

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

effect of government size.

**8. The political level**

8.A judiciary system where corrupt bureaucrats can be effectively charged reduces the potential rewards of corruption and thus minimizes its level.

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*


#### **8. The political level**

I will discuss the prior literature of political level—similar to other levels—along two parallel tracks: the political theoretical frameworks of corruption and the empirical findings of political cross-national comparative studies. Both tracks will be simultaneously presented in a way that contributes to building the hierarchical universal theory of journalism/corruption determinants. Obviously, the most commonly examined political issue is democracy and democratization where the available evidences tentatively indicate the association between higher political competitiveness, democracy, and lower level of corruption; however, this effect is not linear. Some authoritarian countries actually experience slightly less corruption than countries at intermediate levels of democracy. Even authoritarian regimes do not have similar effect with regard to corruption behavior. Dictatorial regimes are significantly more corrupt than single-party and military regimes [90].

Following the transitional phase where countries enjoy more political competitiveness, they tend to be less corrupt [74]. The general idea is that partial, young democracies or countries that experience the transition to consolidated democracy perform worse than authoritarian regimes and much worse than full or older democracies [37, 91]. In support of this ideal view, Montinola and Jackman provide evidence that moderate levels of democracy do not reduce corruption if compared to autocratic regimes. After the transition period to democracy ends, democratic practices do curb corruption [10]. Consistent with this evidence, Ensung suggests that democracy in general decreases corruption with the exception of the early stages of the political liberalization that witnesses higher levels of corruption. His explanation assumes that it is the societal indicators of each society that determine how much democratic reforms can curb corruption [92]. In parallel, with these studies and results, political parties and its strength were also found to be deterring mechanisms. But, corruption prevails in the transition toward modernization where political parties are absent or have no influence on the public involvement in political decision-making [93]. In general, political parties have been found to be behind the prevalence and spreading of corruption as they may reduce the risks of corruption acts [94]. From a political point of view, what influences corruption is not only democracy-related issues, but the overall social, political, and judicial institutions of a given country [20]. Corruption is no more than a contest between those who benefit and those who lose from this illegal and abnormal practices. These two partners reflect the socioeconomic structure in any society. Political changes, therefore, do not curb corruption unless they redesign the balance of power in favor of fighting corruption [140].

The overall result accordingly suggests a failure of the conceptual association posed between democracy and the reduction of corruption [95]. Yet, there exists a complementarity effect of democracy and press freedom. Democratic institutions are much more effective in controlling corruption if the press is free, and free press can only be effective if politicians are accountable to the public [37, 96, 97]. Based on cross-country and panel data, Kalenborn and Lessmann show that conditionality matters, in the sense that press freedom is an important conditioning variable concerning the influence of democratic elections on corruption. Results of their study suggest a collaborative effect of democratic reforms and freedom of the press to provide unbiased information to the voters. Only in countries with high press freedom, voters are able to examine the corrupt behavior of politicians [98]. In this respect, scholars highlight three key democratic institutional factors that deter corruption: first, an increased number of veto players in the form of multiple legislative houses, independent executive branches, and constitutional courts; second, heightened transparency that enables exposure of corrupt behavior and activates vertical and horizontal accountability; and third, strong and large ruling coalitions that disable monopoly [99]. Similarly, data indicate that democracy empowers electorate to remove leaders from office and thus mitigate the impeding effect corruption has on economic growth. Therefore, leaders of many democracies refrain from growth-damaging corruption because they are afraid of punishment at the upcoming election [100, 101].

Based on the preceding discussion, it is obvious that press freedom and democratization have a cooperative relationship. As countries become more democratic, the critical investigative role of the press is intensified. Subsequently, press role in curbing corruption increases [102]. Empirical studies that are based on crosssectional analyses confirm that free press role is intensified if it is accompanied with powerful horizontal political institutions able to hold corrupt official accountable. The most obvious agency is the independent judiciary system that works to sustain the critical role of the press. The picture, then, is that no single factor can fight corruption alone. This fight requires a collaborative role of all accountability mechanisms [63, 103]. The picture, now, will be more confusing if we know that democracy may have dual effects on perception of government corruption. Results obtained from the study of democracy and citizens' perception of government corruption find a significant relationship between macro institutional democracy and micro individual perceptions of government corruption. When conditional effects of rationality including both instrumental calculations and intrinsic values on corruption perceptions were considered, the opposite effect exists. Democracy reduces the perception of government as corrupt [104].

The main reason for the inconsistency among scholars can be partially explained in the light of the multidimensionality of the concept of "democracy" or "democratization." Whereas free and competitive election deepens corruption, other aspects such as freedom of speech, free press and civil liberties control it. To tackle such issues, Hung-En Sung examined democracy-corruption relationship using the three major statistical forms in social sciences (linear, quadratic, and cubic) utilizing up-to-date data covering a larger number of countries. In general, he finds that democratization reduces corruption [92]. As well documented, the level of corruption is more likely to decrease in countries with strong democratic institutions, for many reasons. Democracy mitigates the negative consequences of corruption when it allows the voters through election to expel politicians who engage in corrupt practices [100]. Democratic governments, accordingly, facilitate economic growth and receive the political support they deserve. However, in many cases democratic governments can exploit democratic institutions, and manipulate a network of political support through buying the votes and providing bribes to voters [105].

The comparison between democratic and dictatorial systems extends to cover election campaigns. Researchers prove that since elections are often accompanied with the need to buy votes and bribe voters, it is likely that democratic systems are

**17**

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants*

more vulnerable to corruption than military, authoritarian and autocratic system. For sure, the incentive to finance political campaigns might be a good reason to the prevalence of corruption that never exists in dictatorial governments [106]. For me, this argument may need another look at the definition of corruption itself. Dictatorial political systems that threaten the freedom and dignity of human beings are the worst form of corruption regardless of whether they accommodate elections. Though the corrupt behavior of democratic election campaigns is unjustifiable, it is very naïve harm if compared to the negative consequences of the military and dictatorial systems that deprive citizens from their freedom and dignity. What is the privilege one can earn if he/she lost his dignity and personal freedom? What is the positive economic advantage the whole society can enjoy, if its citizens and institutions live under a dictatorial regime suppressing their basic human rights including the right in life? The narrow approach to political corruption is, then, misleading and has to consider dignity, human freedom, and

Electoral rules, as another political dimension, are also not alike in their effect

1.There is no direct and straightforward relationship between political competitiveness and corruption. The level of corruption is higher in countries with intermediate levels of political competition than in fully democratic or author-

2.The influence of the electoral institutions on corruption depends on the plurality voting system that enables higher level of the individual accountability.

3.Prevalence and persistence of corruption depend on the interaction between three major factors: (1) a discretionary power that enables an authority to tailor the policies and regulation in a discretionary way, (2) extraction of rents by the abuse of the discretionary power, and (3) lack of or weak horizontal and

4.Political stability does not influence corruption directly. It leaves its effect on both the quality of political institutions and the efficiency of judicial authority,

5.Literature does offer contradicting results of the causal relationship between party system and corruption. High political parties' competition may cause corruption and corruption may heighten political parties' competition.

which decrease the degree of compliance with regulations.

on corruption. Results suggest that the ballot structure, district magnitude, and the electoral formula have a strong influence on political corruption [75]. However, countries with higher electoral participation irrespective of the rules according to Adsera and his colleagues have lower levels of corruption [107]. In a similar vein, literature extensively examined the impact of political institutions and specifically political accountability mechanisms on good governance and corruption. Three main features have been identified in the political system that heavily affect corruption: the degree of competition in the political system, the existence of checks and balance mechanisms across different branches of government, and the transparency of the system. Results show that political institutions are extremely significant in determining the level of corruption: democracy, parliamentary systems, political stability, freedom of the press are all associated

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

self-determination issues.

with lower corruption [108].

itarian countries.

vertical accountability agencies.

**8.1 Generalizations**

#### *Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

more vulnerable to corruption than military, authoritarian and autocratic system. For sure, the incentive to finance political campaigns might be a good reason to the prevalence of corruption that never exists in dictatorial governments [106]. For me, this argument may need another look at the definition of corruption itself. Dictatorial political systems that threaten the freedom and dignity of human beings are the worst form of corruption regardless of whether they accommodate elections. Though the corrupt behavior of democratic election campaigns is unjustifiable, it is very naïve harm if compared to the negative consequences of the military and dictatorial systems that deprive citizens from their freedom and dignity. What is the privilege one can earn if he/she lost his dignity and personal freedom? What is the positive economic advantage the whole society can enjoy, if its citizens and institutions live under a dictatorial regime suppressing their basic human rights including the right in life? The narrow approach to political corruption is, then, misleading and has to consider dignity, human freedom, and self-determination issues.

Electoral rules, as another political dimension, are also not alike in their effect on corruption. Results suggest that the ballot structure, district magnitude, and the electoral formula have a strong influence on political corruption [75]. However, countries with higher electoral participation irrespective of the rules according to Adsera and his colleagues have lower levels of corruption [107]. In a similar vein, literature extensively examined the impact of political institutions and specifically political accountability mechanisms on good governance and corruption. Three main features have been identified in the political system that heavily affect corruption: the degree of competition in the political system, the existence of checks and balance mechanisms across different branches of government, and the transparency of the system. Results show that political institutions are extremely significant in determining the level of corruption: democracy, parliamentary systems, political stability, freedom of the press are all associated with lower corruption [108].

#### **8.1 Generalizations**


#### **9. The cultural level**

The cultural level analysis of corruption means that it is rooted in the long-term historical structural determinants that reside beyond the current occurrences and events. It also acknowledges the fact that corruption results from noneconomic and nonpolitical factors that include cultural and religious determinants. Thirdly, it indicates that attitudes toward corruption vary across cultures. Where some cultures totally reject corruption, some others may justify it. As Alejandro Moreno states, justification of corruption is based on different cultural basis. It is highly accepted in post-Communist societies, followed by Latin American and South Asian countries [109]. This result bears some implications to the link between the degree of permissiveness toward corruption, which has a cultural reference, and level of democracy. It says that justification of corruption is wider in nondemocratic cultures than in democratic ones. Finally, the cultural level analysis directly or indirectly implies some sort of ethical violation to the norms as accepted standards and behaviors that stand for ideals of good and virtue [110].

Education, for example, has been proven to be a real cause behind reduction of corruption [111]. It shapes other factors responsible for promoting honesty, and a sense of identity with the entire country rather than with specific cliques or groups [112]. In addition, higher levels of education has been found to generate greater levels of wealth and equality for countries, both of which are associated with lower levels of corruption [113]. Sociologists in contrast to political scientists, economists, and journalism scientists focus on cultural variables including trust in public institutions and a generalized trust as a social capital, dominance of religious values versus nonreligious values, unequal distribution of power and wealth, acceptance of nepotism, level of education, role of religion, and many other cultural factors.

Cultural values are very difficult to change over time and thus as Hofstede explains are uncontrollable and it is unwise to fight corruption through a cultural change process [114]. Based on his results, Husted draws a profile of the corrupt society as one that enjoys high power distance, high uncertainty avoidance, and high masculinity [86]. Power distance is the extent to which powerless people perceive and accept the unequal distribution of power in a culture. In such a culture,

**19**

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants*

the inferiors rely on their superiors in the form of paternalism, which is a main cause of corruption in a society. Uncertainty avoidance refers to the extent to which members of a culture feel threatened by unpredictable environment where corruption can be seen as a way to minimize uncertainty and avoid threat. Masculinity refers to, among other things, a materialized society where the basic measure of success is money as opposed to interest to the quality of life. The more the society is

Religion as a cultural component defining societies receives little attention as a determinant of corruption with radically contradicted results. It is my conviction that all religions prohibit corruption and view it as a dangerous crime, but the eventual impact of the religion depends on its ability to shape social norms and the role of the latter to control behaviors, especially, those in power. In her study, Shadabi uses data of 174 countries in 2010 and all of the economic and noneconomic control variables were considered in its cross-sectional estimations. The results show that religion has no effect on corruption [115]. The neutral position of religion in the fight against corruption has to be extended by more comparative studies across religions. Does Islam, for example, have the same neutral effect similar to Judaism and Christianity? What about Hinduism and Buddhism? Do they have the same neutral effect on corruption? Are disbelievers or seculars more or less corrupt than believers? I do believe that the neutral effect of religion is due to the fact that corruption is committed more by the elite, those who hold the authority, who are less committed to the religious values if compared to the religious

Interestingly, is the effect of women' participation in government on corruption where higher rates of women' involvement in politics lead to lower levels of corruption. The justification is given by two different studies conducted by Robert Gatti and associate and Swamy and associates. Both suggest that women have on average a less tolerant attitude toward corruption [116, 117]. The problem with cultural factors is that it changes slowly and the value system may take decades to bring about very little changes. As such, it is very difficult to rely on cultural changes to fight corruption. Culture consists of orientations to action in particular ways. People acquire cultural values through lifelong socialization. Therefore, if a society experiences dramatic changes in terms of its politics and economy, the persistent cultural values may hamper the expected impact of economic and political liberalization on corruption. Communism, for example, had produced a culture of corruption to the extent that the entire populations had been socialized into values and traditions making corruption an integral part of their life style. Those cultural heritages of communism were unlikely to merely disappear with the new political values that produced them [118]. This obvious problem does not deny the role of culture in determining corruption and its decisive influence. Society is built on norms. Norms are standards of anticipated behaviors that also control the way we interact with each other. Our behavior is mainly influenced by our perception of norms. Our rejection or acceptance of the corrupt behavior depends largely on the norms that cultivate our worldview [71]. Another relevant cultural determinant is income inequality that creates an atmosphere in which corruption develops and flourishes. Whereas the rich have many opportunities to enter into corrupt behaviors and abuse their power to gain personal benefits, the poor struggle to stand against the rich. The ultimate result is the production of public policies that favor the interests of the powerful elites at the expense of marginalized people. The relationship of income inequality with corruption is complex. On the one hand, corruption intensifies inequalities in income distribution [119] and on the other, income distribution inequality significantly increases the level of corruption [120]. The empirical evidence of the influence of inequality comes from the study of Jong-sung and

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

grassroots who are the victims.

materialized, the more tendency it has to corruption [86].

#### *Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

the inferiors rely on their superiors in the form of paternalism, which is a main cause of corruption in a society. Uncertainty avoidance refers to the extent to which members of a culture feel threatened by unpredictable environment where corruption can be seen as a way to minimize uncertainty and avoid threat. Masculinity refers to, among other things, a materialized society where the basic measure of success is money as opposed to interest to the quality of life. The more the society is materialized, the more tendency it has to corruption [86].

Religion as a cultural component defining societies receives little attention as a determinant of corruption with radically contradicted results. It is my conviction that all religions prohibit corruption and view it as a dangerous crime, but the eventual impact of the religion depends on its ability to shape social norms and the role of the latter to control behaviors, especially, those in power. In her study, Shadabi uses data of 174 countries in 2010 and all of the economic and noneconomic control variables were considered in its cross-sectional estimations. The results show that religion has no effect on corruption [115]. The neutral position of religion in the fight against corruption has to be extended by more comparative studies across religions. Does Islam, for example, have the same neutral effect similar to Judaism and Christianity? What about Hinduism and Buddhism? Do they have the same neutral effect on corruption? Are disbelievers or seculars more or less corrupt than believers? I do believe that the neutral effect of religion is due to the fact that corruption is committed more by the elite, those who hold the authority, who are less committed to the religious values if compared to the religious grassroots who are the victims.

Interestingly, is the effect of women' participation in government on corruption where higher rates of women' involvement in politics lead to lower levels of corruption. The justification is given by two different studies conducted by Robert Gatti and associate and Swamy and associates. Both suggest that women have on average a less tolerant attitude toward corruption [116, 117]. The problem with cultural factors is that it changes slowly and the value system may take decades to bring about very little changes. As such, it is very difficult to rely on cultural changes to fight corruption. Culture consists of orientations to action in particular ways. People acquire cultural values through lifelong socialization. Therefore, if a society experiences dramatic changes in terms of its politics and economy, the persistent cultural values may hamper the expected impact of economic and political liberalization on corruption. Communism, for example, had produced a culture of corruption to the extent that the entire populations had been socialized into values and traditions making corruption an integral part of their life style. Those cultural heritages of communism were unlikely to merely disappear with the new political values that produced them [118]. This obvious problem does not deny the role of culture in determining corruption and its decisive influence. Society is built on norms. Norms are standards of anticipated behaviors that also control the way we interact with each other. Our behavior is mainly influenced by our perception of norms. Our rejection or acceptance of the corrupt behavior depends largely on the norms that cultivate our worldview [71]. Another relevant cultural determinant is income inequality that creates an atmosphere in which corruption develops and flourishes. Whereas the rich have many opportunities to enter into corrupt behaviors and abuse their power to gain personal benefits, the poor struggle to stand against the rich. The ultimate result is the production of public policies that favor the interests of the powerful elites at the expense of marginalized people. The relationship of income inequality with corruption is complex. On the one hand, corruption intensifies inequalities in income distribution [119] and on the other, income distribution inequality significantly increases the level of corruption [120]. The empirical evidence of the influence of inequality comes from the study of Jong-sung and

Khagram who found that inequality is as significant as economic factors in determining and explaining corruption [121].

#### **9.1 Generalizations**


#### **10. The international system level**

The conventional wisdom says that the natural cure for corruption is the existence of competition, which is a natural product of international openness. In perfectly competitive markets, outcomes of economic revenues are not subject to the exploitation and manipulation by market actors and thus there is no room for corruption [122]. The standard expectation is that more openness through international trade curbs corruption because states competing globally have to have the norms and culture of global business environment, mainly the rule of law, accountability agencies, and transparency to attract business [123]. The empirical analysis of the relationship between trade openness and corruption is rare. Ades and Di Tella find that corruption is higher in countries where domestic firms are protected by natural and administrative barriers to trade [74]. Similarly, Larrain and Tavares provide evidence supporting the negative effect of openness on corruption, that is, more openness leads to less corruption [122]. Sandholtz and Gray reach the same conclusion when they provide evidence supporting their hypothesis stating that greater degree of international integration lowers levels of corruption. They analyze data from 150 countries that support the justification of the role of international integration in importing cultural norms that deter corruption and alters the costs and benefits of engaging in corrupt acts [124].

In a parallel vein, other empirical findings lend significant support to the positive relationship between openness and good governance [125–128]. Statistical analysis proves that openness to foreign trade significantly hinders corruption [126, 129]. However, the size of the effect is very small. A real difference to a country's level of perceived corruption would require a substantial integration in global trade rather than a little change [130]. One measure of competitive pressures is the integration

**21**

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants*

political openness on corruption is conditioned by domestic factors.

is simply it depends on the wider cultural and sociopolitical context.

since they are in line with the right of self-determination [133].

The most dangerous international source and determinant of corruption, I argue, is the double standards employed by the United States and other powerful European countries against the weak and developing countries. If corruption as Gerald Caiden argues takes place when things are not what they ought to be [14], then, violation of international law by any state should be seen as corruption. In this context, the Israeli occupation of Palestine since 1948 right now with full support of United States and several European countries is by definition the worst form of corruption [133]. Within the past 70 years or so, Israel has occupied Palestine and was permitted to invade and attack numerous neighboring countries with full support of the United States and several European countries, without any true positive interference from the U.N or Security Council [134]. The illegitimacy of the Israeli occupation provides the legal justification for defending and interpreting all other issues pertaining to the dilemma of the Palestinians, including all acts of resistance

In a similar vein, Karen Del Biondo provides evidence that there have been double standards in the EU's reactions to the violations of democratic principles in 10 African countries. The similar violations of democratic principles by Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Chad, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Guinea, Côte d'Ivoire, and

In a slightly different thread of research, Mukherjee concludes that greater economic globalization does not reduce bureaucratic corruption. However, he argues that this finding does not necessarily deny the importance of global trade engagement. Rather, it reflects that curbing corruption is not only an outcome of integration in global economy that stems from a nexus of complicated and hierarchical bureaucracy [132]. Consistent with this view, Gatti tested the conventional wisdom that international openness reduces corruption by analyzing whether the presence of obstacles to international trade and capital flows is correlated with higher level of corruption and found no evidence to support his hypothesis. Instead, his conclusion states that the main impact stems from the incentives of collusive behaviors between the two partners: individuals and customs officials, rather than from the restrictive trade policy that lowers the openness and foreign competition [127]. Another international factor that seems to affect the level of corruption is the colonial heritage. Studies show that countries that were British colonies have significantly lower perceived corruption. This is because most former British colonies have common law systems [130]. In the light of the debate of global trade and corruption, it seems that the only verified result of international openness and corruption

of a country into the global economy. If competition reduces corruption, then increased openness to international trade and investment should go along with less corruption [8]. According to an empirical study, it has been found that globalization is a powerful weapon against corruption only for middle- and high-income countries, while for low-income countries it has no significant impact. For such countries, fighting corruption requires additional global action aiming at the reduction of poverty [131]. There are good reasons for why globalization minimizes corruption as it exposes the globalized country to anti-corruption norms. The international networks of Western countries transmit the anti-corruption values to countries connected to globalization [124]. Sandholtz and Gray report that the more international organizations a country belongs to and the longer it has been a part of the major international institutions, such as the United Nations, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade/World Trade Organization (GATT/WTO), and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the lower its level of corruption [124]. There is no doubt that social and political openness enhance information availability to a number of new players in politics. Yet, according to the study of [91] Charron, impact of social and

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

#### *Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

of a country into the global economy. If competition reduces corruption, then increased openness to international trade and investment should go along with less corruption [8]. According to an empirical study, it has been found that globalization is a powerful weapon against corruption only for middle- and high-income countries, while for low-income countries it has no significant impact. For such countries, fighting corruption requires additional global action aiming at the reduction of poverty [131]. There are good reasons for why globalization minimizes corruption as it exposes the globalized country to anti-corruption norms. The international networks of Western countries transmit the anti-corruption values to countries connected to globalization [124]. Sandholtz and Gray report that the more international organizations a country belongs to and the longer it has been a part of the major international institutions, such as the United Nations, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade/World Trade Organization (GATT/WTO), and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the lower its level of corruption [124]. There is no doubt that social and political openness enhance information availability to a number of new players in politics. Yet, according to the study of [91] Charron, impact of social and political openness on corruption is conditioned by domestic factors.

In a slightly different thread of research, Mukherjee concludes that greater economic globalization does not reduce bureaucratic corruption. However, he argues that this finding does not necessarily deny the importance of global trade engagement. Rather, it reflects that curbing corruption is not only an outcome of integration in global economy that stems from a nexus of complicated and hierarchical bureaucracy [132]. Consistent with this view, Gatti tested the conventional wisdom that international openness reduces corruption by analyzing whether the presence of obstacles to international trade and capital flows is correlated with higher level of corruption and found no evidence to support his hypothesis. Instead, his conclusion states that the main impact stems from the incentives of collusive behaviors between the two partners: individuals and customs officials, rather than from the restrictive trade policy that lowers the openness and foreign competition [127]. Another international factor that seems to affect the level of corruption is the colonial heritage. Studies show that countries that were British colonies have significantly lower perceived corruption. This is because most former British colonies have common law systems [130]. In the light of the debate of global trade and corruption, it seems that the only verified result of international openness and corruption is simply it depends on the wider cultural and sociopolitical context.

The most dangerous international source and determinant of corruption, I argue, is the double standards employed by the United States and other powerful European countries against the weak and developing countries. If corruption as Gerald Caiden argues takes place when things are not what they ought to be [14], then, violation of international law by any state should be seen as corruption. In this context, the Israeli occupation of Palestine since 1948 right now with full support of United States and several European countries is by definition the worst form of corruption [133]. Within the past 70 years or so, Israel has occupied Palestine and was permitted to invade and attack numerous neighboring countries with full support of the United States and several European countries, without any true positive interference from the U.N or Security Council [134]. The illegitimacy of the Israeli occupation provides the legal justification for defending and interpreting all other issues pertaining to the dilemma of the Palestinians, including all acts of resistance since they are in line with the right of self-determination [133].

In a similar vein, Karen Del Biondo provides evidence that there have been double standards in the EU's reactions to the violations of democratic principles in 10 African countries. The similar violations of democratic principles by Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Chad, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Guinea, Côte d'Ivoire, and

Zimbabwe received dissimilar reactions to protect the self-interested objectives of the EU [135]. An up-to-date example of the international corruption according to my suggested definition is the intervention of USA and several European countries to suppress the Arab Spring revolutions. The serious consequences of such interference are reflected in the decline of press freedom and civil liberties, lack of rule of law and accountability agencies which, in turn, worsen the level and magnitude of corruption. In other words, the systemic corruption of the developing countries could be partially attributed to foreign policies of some Western countries that seek to serve their own interests at the expense of the rights of the marginalized peoples of the East. Hindering democratic transformation in developing countries under any justification may not serve the developed countries themselves. Corruption is one of the main causes behind poverty, unemployment, poor quality of life, depression, and all social and political and economic problems the whole society, especially youth suffer from [136]. What I like to stress is the fact that some of Western countries through their foreign policies that work against the aspirations of peoples of developing countries toward freedom, democracy, and dignity increase corruption in such countries, which eventually harms the West. Supporting nondemocratic governments equals defending corruption as dictators make no distinction between their own wealth and that of their countries [24]. Nondemocratic governors are above the law and cannot be held accountable. As such, the best international policy for fighting corruption is to promote real democratic systems that respect the rule of law, enhance accountability, press freedom, civil liberties, and social and economic justice.

Adding the international domain in the analysis of corruption is obviously justified by the current research that has tended to be fragmented. Scholars often exhibit little familiarity in areas of research other than their own fields [24, 137, 138]. As a result, progress in explaining this cancer or coronavirus pandemic that is damaging the fabric of any hope for stability, democracy, and welfare will continue without a real cure. I therefore, suggest that the starting point is to reconsider a new definition of corruption embracing the dynamic collaboration among the five hierarchal layers with emphasis on the highest level, the international. I also assume that: (1) The double standards policies of some powerful Western states are in stark contrast with any international anti-corruption policy the World Bank, IMF and other international and regional organizations adopt to fight corruption. (2) The incredible illegal support of USA to Israeli's occupation of Palestine is the main source of corruption in Arab countries that delay projects of political and economic development over seven decades with the hope to free Palestine. Unfortunately, their efforts in the two fronts lead to a big failure. (3) Western countries' position against the aspirations of developing countries for freedom, rule of law, dignity, and democracy perpetuates the systemic corruption and helps export terrorism and migration to the West. (4) I, therefore, presume that emphasis on the missing part of corruption studies, the international dimension, will provide a perfect insight on how to understand the mechanisms through which corruption works. It is a vicious cycle through which causes of corruption trickle down from the upper to the lower level and to the bottom, journalism as depicted in the graph of the hierarchal universal theory. The ultimate result of this cycle is a type of journalism that enters into strong and permanent alliance with corrupt and dictatorial governments. Journalism is a key factor affecting vertical and horizontal accountability institutions. Not only this, but it defends the wrongdoing of corrupt officials and serves against any peaceful means to change them or hold them accountable. Since, corruption as reviewed here is an economic, political, and cultural issue expressing a big failure of the whole society, journalism performance also decreases the risks and costs of corruption and publicizes the impunity culture that tolerates the corruptible.

**23**

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants*

see corruption as monopoly + discretion – accountability ([25], p. 75).

cantly, while a marginal shift does not make a difference.

productive activities to unproductive rent seeking activities.

fight corruption including World Bank and IMF.

The corrupt journalism serves mainly to suppress diversity, particularly, the opposition voices while maintaining and strengthening its ties with corrupt alliances, supporting monopoly, discretion and attacking accountability. This analysis illustrates to a large extent the penetration of journalism influences into the fabric of the three major ingredients of formula of corruption suggested by Klitgaard who

1.Globalization exerts a powerful impact on decreasing corruption in high- or middle-income countries; however, it has no impact in low-income countries.

2.A substantial opening to foreign trade is required to lower corruption signifi-

3.The level of corruption is negatively correlated with the legal cultures of the

4.International quantitative trade constraints shift the economy from directly

5.Corrupt behaviors grow and flourish in closed economies, while countries involved in international economy expose themselves to all types of controls

6.In many cases, globalization has increased corruption as it involves a low level of risk discovery and penalty which encourages a high benefit of bribery and

7.Occupation of Palestinian state by Israel represents the worst from of international corruption that violates the international law and the international

8.Defending the Israeli occupation for Palestinian state by USA and some powerful European states works against the aims of all international agencies that

9.Any effort from USA and some powerful European states to hinder the revolutions of developing countries is an effort to perpetuate corruption and increase the likelihood of migration and terrorism that they are currently suffering from.

**11. Building a hierarchal universal theory of journalism-corruption** 

"The hierarchical universal theory of journalism/corruption determinants" intends to accommodate the various variables and underlying relations affecting corruption organized in a continuum from macro-international to micro-journalistic or individual level. In our effort to build the theory, we went—right now through three steps: (1) The first step identifies the five interactive hierarchical levels of influences. (2) The second step reviews the most relevant empirical studies carried out in each level. (3) The third step introduces the generalizations/the results obtained from the empirical studies/existing literature. (4) The remaining

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

**10.1 Generalizations**

former colonial heritage.

that minimize corruption.

humanitarian laws.

**determinants**

profit.

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

The corrupt journalism serves mainly to suppress diversity, particularly, the opposition voices while maintaining and strengthening its ties with corrupt alliances, supporting monopoly, discretion and attacking accountability. This analysis illustrates to a large extent the penetration of journalism influences into the fabric of the three major ingredients of formula of corruption suggested by Klitgaard who see corruption as monopoly + discretion – accountability ([25], p. 75).

#### **10.1 Generalizations**


#### **11. Building a hierarchal universal theory of journalism-corruption determinants**

"The hierarchical universal theory of journalism/corruption determinants" intends to accommodate the various variables and underlying relations affecting corruption organized in a continuum from macro-international to micro-journalistic or individual level. In our effort to build the theory, we went—right now through three steps: (1) The first step identifies the five interactive hierarchical levels of influences. (2) The second step reviews the most relevant empirical studies carried out in each level. (3) The third step introduces the generalizations/the results obtained from the empirical studies/existing literature. (4) The remaining

step (the fourth) intends to synthesize the main cross-border hypotheses that create linkages capable to explain corruption, predict it, direct the future studies, and finally contribute to reducing it.

The challenging question is how to study variables pertaining to several levels interacting together to restrain or spread corruption. This question suggests a conceptual universal cross-cultural, multidisciplinary perspective beyond the traditionally single studies dedicated to examining a direct liner relationship within a specific level or sublevel. A levels-of-analysis perspective, as suggested by Thomas Hanitzsch, has been promising in sketching a universal framework for large-scale comparative analysis [139]. In this respect, Stephen Reese argues-in his conceptualization of the hierarchical influences approach—that is dedicated only to global journalism studies—that most research is not planned to examine variables attached to all levels of influence once. However, scholars can consider a multilevel interpretation of their results or actually take a further step to account for interaction among hierarchical levels [140]. The hierarchal theory shows to what extent there is a need to redirect corruption research to understand how it works to help them contribute to policies and initiatives of corruption fighting.

### **12. Cross-border hypotheses**

Before stating such hypotheses and closing this chapter, it is important to emphasize some cautions. (1) As is obvious, it is beyond my capacity, time and space limit to review all relevant theoretical and empirical works that fit into each level of analysis. Given the richness and unlimited scholarship produced on the subject, it would be impossible to cover all at once. The aim of my attempt is to redesign a new theory that aims at drawing a universal map for what has been carried out and what is still missing. What is important is the conceptual framework and methodological underpinnings that future research can consider. (2) Despite the fact that multidisciplinary international comparative studies are the recommended type of research to test the cross-border hypotheses, other types of research studies and methods, quantitative and qualitative, single cases using different indexes measuring corruption through one point of time or longitudinal studies are of added value for understanding corruption. (3) The approach we adopt in building this theory is based on the concept of science as a dynamic process of critical thinking, raising questions, and formulating hypotheses and not a body of knowledge. It is a matter of identifying the possible relationships between variables we can empirically observe and test [141]. (4) The following list of hypotheses is just initial step in the ongoing research and conceptual work that helps understand journalism-corruption determinants in their comprehensive framework. They are not by any definition a comprehensive view.


**25**

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants*

competitions and higher levels of social capital and international integration

4.The watchdog role of journalism enhances good governance, rule of law, accountability, less levels of income inequality and hence lower levels of corruption.

5.Alliances between USA, powerful European nations, and dictators in developing countries are related to diffusion of state-owned and captured journalism, centralized governments, lower levels of transparency, and, hence, higher

6.As totalitarian and authoritarian systems prevail, monopoly and centralization dominate, bureaucracy and public sector increase, the closed economies

7.As double standards in international politics dominate, sources of corruption develop, and alliances between ruling elites in developed and developing countries strengthen, journalism institutions are more likely to serve the interests of the elites at the expense of the general public, and the divide between the rich

8.As educational and cultural levels of the general public increase, journalism ethical performance prevails, its watchdog role intensifies, democratic and accountability institutions and practices are more likely to exist, and corruption

9.As social networks penetration increase, vertical accountability dominates, rule of law enhances, the cost of corrupt behavior grows, and incidence of cor-

10.Watchdog journalism is more likely to have a preventive effect of corruption in a context where vertical and horizontal accountability exist, anti-corruption norms prevail, discretionary power of the elites is at its minimum, and finally

where the judicial system offers higher level of corruption penalty.

11.Journalists' autonomy and safety are prerequisites in the fight against corruption as independent investigative reports threaten and damage the horizontal and vertical cooperation between the corrupt agencies in the corrupt states. However, without independent judiciary system, and strong civil society, the corrupt authority will suppress the independent and free voices

12.Perception of corruption as a proxy for actual corruption should not be taken for granted. In corrupt regimes where journalism is owned, controlled, and operated by corrupt ruling elites, corruption crimes and accusations are used as conspiracy tool in the hands of dictators to manipulate the public mind and

13.Though systemic corruption is rooted in the historical, cultural, and political structure, policy changes and definitely mass education and press freedom can

distract the attention from focusing on efforts of regime change.

exist, and corruption diffuses in all domains of life.

and the poor widens, leading to higher levels of corruption.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

and lower levels of corruption.

levels of corruption.

levels decrease.

ruption reduces.

of journalism.

help in reducing corruption.

3.Journalism conditions and specifically its freedom, diversity, and independence are closely related to higher levels of economic and political

competitions and higher levels of social capital and international integration and lower levels of corruption.


### **Author details**

Basyouni Ibrahim Hamada Department of Mass Communication, College of Arts and Sciences, Qatar University, Doha, Qatar

\*Address all correspondence to: bhamada@qu.edu.qa

© 2020 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

**27**

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants*

study. British Journal of Political Science. 2002;**32**(1):147-170

[11] Hallin D, Mancini P, editors. Comparing Media Systems: Three Models of Media and Politics, 2004. Cambridge: Cambridge University

[12] Rugh W. Do national political systems still influence Arab media? Arab Media and Society. 2007;**5**(26):1-21

[13] Hanitzsch T et al. Mapping journalism cultures across nations: A comparative study of 18 countries. Journalism Studies. 2011;**12**(3):273-293

[14] Caiden G. Undermining good governance: Corruption and democracy. Asian Journal of Political Science.

[15] Rose-Ackerman S. The role of the World Bank in controlling corruption. In: Faculty Scholarship Series. 591. Vol. 29. 1997. pp. 90-113. Available from: http://digitalcommons.law.yale.edu/

[16] Shoemaker PJ, Reese SD. Mediating the Message: Theories of Influences on Mass Media Content. New York:

[17] Ee Suns H. A convergence approach to the analysis of political corruption: A cross-national study. Crime, Law and

[18] Tiky N. The Causes of Corruption: Explaining the High Levels of Corruption in Developing Countries. Dallas: The University of Texas at Dallas; 2010. p. 147

[19] Monroe K. The Economic Approach to Politics: A Critical Reassessment of the Theory of Rational Action. Harper

Social Change. 2002;**38**:137-160

[20] Johnston M. Syndromes of Corruption: Wealth, Power, and

Press; 2004

2008;**5**(2):1-22

fss\_papers/591

Longman; 1996

Collins; 1991

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

[1] Mauro P. Corruption and growth. The Quarterly Journal of Economics.

[2] Kaufmann D, Kraay A, Mastruzzi M. Measuring Corruption: Myths and Realities. Washington: World Bank; 2007

[3] Hellman JS, Jones G, Kaufmann D, Schankerman M. Measuring Governance, Corruption, and State Capture: How Firms and Bureaucrats Shape the Business Environment in Transition Economies. World Bank Policy Working Paper. Washington, DC: World Bank; 1999

[4] Kurer O. Corruption: An

Studies. 1997;**XLV**:417-435

2005;**53**:222-239

alternative approach to its definition and measurement. Political Studies.

[5] Heywood P. Political corruption: Problems and perspectives. Political

[6] De Graaf G. Causes of corruption: Towards a contextual theory of corruption. Public Administration Quarterly. 2007;**31**(7):39-86

[7] Lange D. A multidimensional conceptualization of organizational corruption control. Academy of

[8] Lambsdorff G. Causes and consequences of corruption: What do we know from a cross-section of countries? In: Ackerman R, editor. International Handbook on the

[9] Galtung F. Measuring the immeasurable: Boundaries and

Management Review. 2008;**33**(3):710-729

Economics of Corruption. USA: Edward Elgar Publishing Limited; 2006. pp. 3-50

functions of (macro) corruption indices. In: Galtung F, Sampford C, editors. Measuring Corruption. UK: Ashgate; 2005

[10] Montinola GR, Jackman RW. Sources of corruption: A cross-country

**References**

1995;**110**(3):681-712

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

#### **References**

[1] Mauro P. Corruption and growth. The Quarterly Journal of Economics. 1995;**110**(3):681-712

[2] Kaufmann D, Kraay A, Mastruzzi M. Measuring Corruption: Myths and Realities. Washington: World Bank; 2007

[3] Hellman JS, Jones G, Kaufmann D, Schankerman M. Measuring Governance, Corruption, and State Capture: How Firms and Bureaucrats Shape the Business Environment in Transition Economies. World Bank Policy Working Paper. Washington, DC: World Bank; 1999

[4] Kurer O. Corruption: An alternative approach to its definition and measurement. Political Studies. 2005;**53**:222-239

[5] Heywood P. Political corruption: Problems and perspectives. Political Studies. 1997;**XLV**:417-435

[6] De Graaf G. Causes of corruption: Towards a contextual theory of corruption. Public Administration Quarterly. 2007;**31**(7):39-86

[7] Lange D. A multidimensional conceptualization of organizational corruption control. Academy of Management Review. 2008;**33**(3):710-729

[8] Lambsdorff G. Causes and consequences of corruption: What do we know from a cross-section of countries? In: Ackerman R, editor. International Handbook on the Economics of Corruption. USA: Edward Elgar Publishing Limited; 2006. pp. 3-50

[9] Galtung F. Measuring the immeasurable: Boundaries and functions of (macro) corruption indices. In: Galtung F, Sampford C, editors. Measuring Corruption. UK: Ashgate; 2005

[10] Montinola GR, Jackman RW. Sources of corruption: A cross-country study. British Journal of Political Science. 2002;**32**(1):147-170

[11] Hallin D, Mancini P, editors. Comparing Media Systems: Three Models of Media and Politics, 2004. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 2004

[12] Rugh W. Do national political systems still influence Arab media? Arab Media and Society. 2007;**5**(26):1-21

[13] Hanitzsch T et al. Mapping journalism cultures across nations: A comparative study of 18 countries. Journalism Studies. 2011;**12**(3):273-293

[14] Caiden G. Undermining good governance: Corruption and democracy. Asian Journal of Political Science. 2008;**5**(2):1-22

[15] Rose-Ackerman S. The role of the World Bank in controlling corruption. In: Faculty Scholarship Series. 591. Vol. 29. 1997. pp. 90-113. Available from: http://digitalcommons.law.yale.edu/ fss\_papers/591

[16] Shoemaker PJ, Reese SD. Mediating the Message: Theories of Influences on Mass Media Content. New York: Longman; 1996

[17] Ee Suns H. A convergence approach to the analysis of political corruption: A cross-national study. Crime, Law and Social Change. 2002;**38**:137-160

[18] Tiky N. The Causes of Corruption: Explaining the High Levels of Corruption in Developing Countries. Dallas: The University of Texas at Dallas; 2010. p. 147

[19] Monroe K. The Economic Approach to Politics: A Critical Reassessment of the Theory of Rational Action. Harper Collins; 1991

[20] Johnston M. Syndromes of Corruption: Wealth, Power, and Democracy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 2005

[21] Hellmann O. The historical origins of corruption in the developing world: A comparative analysis of East Asia. Crime, Law and Social Change. 2017;**68**(1-2):145-165

[22] Uslaner EM, Rothstein B. The historical roots of corruption: State building, economic inequality, and mass education. Comparative Politics. 2016;**48**(2):227-248

[23] Steinmo S. Historical institutionalism. In: Porta D, Keating M, editors. Approaches and Methodologies in the Social Sciences: A Pluralist Perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 2008

[24] Jain A. Corruption: A review. Journal of Economic Surveys. 2001;**15**(1):71-120

[25] Klitgaard R. Controlling Corruption. Berkeley: University of California Press; 1988

[26] Lapalombara J. Structural and institutional aspects of corruption. Social Research. 1994;**61**(2):325-350

[27] Zimring F, Johnson D. On the comparative study of corruption. British Journal of Criminology. 2005;**45**(6):793-809

[28] Stapenhurst F, Langseth P. The role of public administration in fighting corruption. International Journal of Public Sector Management. 1997;**10**(5):311-330

[29] Doig A, Theobald R. Introduction: Why corruption? Commonwealth & Comparative Politics. 1999;**37**(3):1-12

[30] Cisar O. Strategies for Using Information Technologies for Curbing Public-Sector Corruption: The Case of the Czech Republic (CR). Budapest: Open Society Institute; 2003

[31] Hogdson GM, Jiang S. The economics of corruption and the corruption of economics: An Institutionalist perspective. Journal of Economic Issues. 2016;**41**(4):1043-1061

[32] Lambsdorff JG. Corruption in empirical research: A review. In: Transparency International Working Paper. 1999

[33] Lambsdorff JG. The Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index 1999: Framework Document. Berlin: Transparency International; 1999

[34] Bussell J. Typologies of corruption: A pragmatic approach. In: Ackerman SR, Lagunes P, Luce H, editors. Greed, Corruption, and the Modern State Essays in Political Economy. USA: Edward Elgar Pub; 2015. pp. 21-45

[35] Helman D. Defining corruption and contitutionalizing democracy. Michigan Law Review. 2013;**111**(8):1384-1421

[36] Ahrend R. Press Freedom, Human Capital and Corruption. DELTA Working Paper (2002-11). Paris: Delta; 2002

[37] Chowdhury SK. The effect of democracy and press freedom on corruption: An empirical test. Economics Letters. 2004;**85**(1):93-101

[38] Stapenhurst R. The Media's Role in Curbing Corruption. Washington, DC: World Bank Institute; 2000

[39] Fardigh M, Andersson AE, Oscarsson H. Reexamining the Relationship between Press Freedom and Corruption; 2011. p. 13

[40] Bojanic D. The Effect of Internet and Digital Media Freedom on Corruption. Aarhus School of Business, Aarhus University; 2014

[41] Freille S, Haque ME, Kneller R. A contribution to the empirics of press freedom and corruption. European

**29**

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants*

human development and mass communication. In: Frank E,

Barbara P, editors. Comparing Political Communication: Theories, Cases and Challenges. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press; 2004. pp. 115-150

[52] Hamada BI, Abdel-Salam A-SG, Elkilany EA. Press Freedom and Corruption: An Examination of the Relationship. Global Media and

[53] Besley T, Prat A. Handcuffs for the Grabbing Hand? Media Capture and Government Accountability. Political Economy and Public Policy Series. The

[54] Djankov S et al. Who owns the media? Journal of Law and Economics.

[55] Stromberg D. Mass media and public policy. European Economic Review. 2001;**45**(4-6):652-663

[56] Stapenhurst R. The Media's Role in Curbing Corruption. New York: World

[57] Protess D et al. The Journalism of Outrage: Investigative Reporting and Agenda-Building in America. New York:

[58] Norris P. The role of the free press in promoting democratization, good governance, and human development.

Association, Annual Meeting. Chicago: World Press Freedom Day, Chicago

assessing accountability: A conceptual framework. European Law Journal.

Communication; 2019

Suntory Centre; 2005

2003;**46**(2):341-381

Bank Institute; 2002

The Guildford Press; 1991

In: Midwest Political Science

[59] Bovens M. Analysing and

[60] O'Donnell G. Horizontal accountability in new democracies. In: Andreas S, Larry D, Plantter MF, editors. The Self-Restraining State.

Palmer House; 2006

2007;**13**(4):447-468

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

Journal of Political Economy.

[42] Samanta S, Pleskov I, Zadeh A. Religion as a determinant of corruption: Comparative evidence from OPEC and OECD countries. International Journal of Management. 2010;**27**(3):728-748

[43] Brunetti A, Weder B. A free press is bad news for corruption. Journal of Public Economics. 2003;**87**(87):1801-1824

[44] Dutta N, Roy S. The interactive impact of press freedom and media reach on corruption. Economic Modelling. 2016;**58**:227-236

[45] Graber D. Press freedom and the general welfare. Political Science

[46] Vaidya S. Corruption in the medias gaze. European Journal of Political

Transparency is not enough: Making transparency effective in reducing corruption. International Political Science Review. 2010;**31**(3):301-322

[48] Sharafutdinova G. What explains corruption perceptions? The dark side of political competition in Russia's regions. Comparative Politics.

[49] Virginie C. Russia's distorted anticorruption campaigns. In:

Sajo SKAA, editor. Political Corruption in Transition. Budapest: Central European University Press; 2002

[50] Ahrend R. Press Freedom, Human Capital and Corruption. DELTA; 2002. pp. 1-36. Working Paper No. 2002-11. DOI: 10.2139/ssrn.620102. Available from: https://ssrn.com/abstract=620102

[51] Norris P. Global political communication. Good governance,

Quarterly. 1986;**101**:257-275

Economy. 2005;**21**:667-687

[47] Lindstedt C, Naurin D.

2010;**42**(2):147-166

2007;**23**(4):838-862

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

Journal of Political Economy. 2007;**23**(4):838-862

[42] Samanta S, Pleskov I, Zadeh A. Religion as a determinant of corruption: Comparative evidence from OPEC and OECD countries. International Journal of Management. 2010;**27**(3):728-748

[43] Brunetti A, Weder B. A free press is bad news for corruption. Journal of Public Economics. 2003;**87**(87):1801-1824

[44] Dutta N, Roy S. The interactive impact of press freedom and media reach on corruption. Economic Modelling. 2016;**58**:227-236

[45] Graber D. Press freedom and the general welfare. Political Science Quarterly. 1986;**101**:257-275

[46] Vaidya S. Corruption in the medias gaze. European Journal of Political Economy. 2005;**21**:667-687

[47] Lindstedt C, Naurin D. Transparency is not enough: Making transparency effective in reducing corruption. International Political Science Review. 2010;**31**(3):301-322

[48] Sharafutdinova G. What explains corruption perceptions? The dark side of political competition in Russia's regions. Comparative Politics. 2010;**42**(2):147-166

[49] Virginie C. Russia's distorted anticorruption campaigns. In: Sajo SKAA, editor. Political Corruption in Transition. Budapest: Central European University Press; 2002

[50] Ahrend R. Press Freedom, Human Capital and Corruption. DELTA; 2002. pp. 1-36. Working Paper No. 2002-11. DOI: 10.2139/ssrn.620102. Available from: https://ssrn.com/abstract=620102

[51] Norris P. Global political communication. Good governance, human development and mass communication. In: Frank E, Barbara P, editors. Comparing Political Communication: Theories, Cases and Challenges. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press; 2004. pp. 115-150

[52] Hamada BI, Abdel-Salam A-SG, Elkilany EA. Press Freedom and Corruption: An Examination of the Relationship. Global Media and Communication; 2019

[53] Besley T, Prat A. Handcuffs for the Grabbing Hand? Media Capture and Government Accountability. Political Economy and Public Policy Series. The Suntory Centre; 2005

[54] Djankov S et al. Who owns the media? Journal of Law and Economics. 2003;**46**(2):341-381

[55] Stromberg D. Mass media and public policy. European Economic Review. 2001;**45**(4-6):652-663

[56] Stapenhurst R. The Media's Role in Curbing Corruption. New York: World Bank Institute; 2002

[57] Protess D et al. The Journalism of Outrage: Investigative Reporting and Agenda-Building in America. New York: The Guildford Press; 1991

[58] Norris P. The role of the free press in promoting democratization, good governance, and human development. In: Midwest Political Science Association, Annual Meeting. Chicago: World Press Freedom Day, Chicago Palmer House; 2006

[59] Bovens M. Analysing and assessing accountability: A conceptual framework. European Law Journal. 2007;**13**(4):447-468

[60] O'Donnell G. Horizontal accountability in new democracies. In: Andreas S, Larry D, Plantter MF, editors. The Self-Restraining State.

Boulder, CO: Lynne Reinner; 1999. pp. 29-52

[61] Schedler A. Conceptualizing accountability. In: Schedler A, Diamond L, Plantter MF, editors. The Self-Restraining State. Boulder, CO: Lynne Reinner; 1999. pp. 13-28

[62] Grossman G, Elhanan H. Special Interest Politics. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press; 2001

[63] Camaj L. The Media's role in fighting corruption: Media effects on governmental Accountability. The International Journal of Press/Politics. 2013;**18**(1):21-42

[64] Peruzzotti E, Smulovitz C. Social accountability. In: Peruzzotti E, Smulovitz C, editors. Enforcing the Rule of Law: Social Accountability in the New Latin American Democracies. Pittsburgh PA: University of Pittsburgh Press; 2006. pp. 3-33

[65] Miller GS. The press as a watchdog for accounting fraud. Journal of Accounting Research. 2006;**44**(5):1001-1033

[66] Schudson M. The Power of News. Cambridge: Harvard University Press; 1996

[67] Waisbord S. The challenges of investigative journalism. University of Miami Law Review. 2002;**56**(2):377. Available from: http://repository.law. miami.edu/umlr/vol56/iss2/6

[68] Enikolopov R, Petrova M, Sonin K. Social media and corruption. American Economic Journal: Applied Economics. 2018;**10**(1):150-174

[69] Starke C, Naab T, Scherer H. Free to expose corruption: The impact of media freedom, internet access, and governmental online service delivery on corruption. International Journal of Communication. 2016;**10**:4702-4722

[70] Besley T, Burgess R, Prat A. Mass media and political accountability. In: Islam R, Djankov S, McLeish C, editors. The Right to Tell: The Role of Mass Media in Economic Development. Washington: World Bank Institute Development Studies; 2002. pp. 45-60

[71] Arnold A, Lal S. Using media to fight corruption. In: A Paper for the 2011 Asia Regional Peer-Learning and Knowledge Sharing Workshop "Engaging Citizens against Corruption in Asia: Approaches, Results and Lessons"; 2012

[72] Dimant E. The Nature of Corruption: An Interdisciplinary Perspective. Economics Discussion Papers. Kiel Institute for the World Economy; 2013. p. 59. Retrieved from: http://www.economics-ejournal.org/ economics/discussionpapers/2013-59

[73] Johnson S, Kaufama D, Zoido P. Regulatory discretion and the unofficial economy. American Economic Review. 1998;**88**:387-392

[74] Ades A, Tella RD. Rents, competition, and corruption. The American Economic Review. 1999;**89**(4):982-993

[75] Bliss C, Tella R. Does competition kill corruption? The Journal of Political Economy. 1979;**105**(5):1001-1023

[76] Ackerman SR. Corruption and Government: Causes, Consequences, and Reform. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 1999

[77] McGuire MC, Olson M. The economics of autocracy and majority rule: The invisible hand and the use of force. Journal of Economic Literature. 1998;**34**(1):72-96

[78] Zaloznaya M. Does authoritarianism breed corruption? Reconsidering the relationship between authoritarian governance and corrupt exchanges in bureaucracies. Law & Social Inquiry. 2015;**40**(2):345-376

**31**

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants*

investigation. Economic Modelling.

[90] Golden M. Sources of corruption in authoritarian Regimens. Social Science

[91] Charron N. The impact of sociopolitical integration and press freedom on corruption. Journal of Development

2012;**29**(6):2340-2348

Quarterly. 2010;**91**(1):1-20

Studies. 2009;**45**(9):1472-1493

[92] Ensung H. Democracy and political corruption: A cross-national comparison. Crime, Law and Social

[93] Huntington S. Political Order in Changing Societies. New Haven: Yale

[94] Porta D. Political parties and corruption: Ten hypotheses on five vicious circles. Crime, Law and Social

[95] Blake CH, Martin CG. The dynamics of political corruption: Re-examining

[96] Bhattacharyya S, Hodler R. Media freedom and democracy in the fight against corruption. European Journal of

[97] Pellegata A. Constraining political corruption: An empirical analysis of the impact of democracy. Democratization.

[98] Kalenborn C, Lessmann C. The impact of democracy and press

[99] Schopf C. Deterring extortive corruption in Korea through democratization and the rule of law. Journal of Comparative Asian Development. 2015;**14**(2):279-318

[100] Drury AC, Krieckhaus J,

Lusztig M. Corruption, democracy, and

freedom on corruption: Conditionality matters. Journal of Policy Modeling.

Political Economy. 2015;**39**:13-24

2013;**20**(7):1195-1218

2013;**35**(6):857-886

Change. 2004;**41**:179-194

University Press; 1968

Change. 2004;**42**:35-60

the influence of democracy. Democratization. 2006;**13**(1):1-14

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

Economics Letters. 2009;**105**(2):173-176

[81] Sun Y, Johnston M. Does democracy check corruption? Insights from China and India. Comparative Politics.

[80] Campbell N, Saha S. Corruption, democracy and Asia-Pacific countries. Journal of the Asia Pacific Economy.

[79] Saha S, Gounder R, Je Su J. The interaction effect of economic freedom

and democracy on corruption.

[82] Rock MT. Corruption and democracy. Journal of Development

[83] Lambsdorff JG, Cornelius P. Corruption, foreign investment and growth. In: Schwab LK, et al., editor. Competitiveness Report 2000/2001. World Economic Forum and the

Institute for International Development. Oxford: Harvard University/Oxford University Press; 2000. pp. 70-78

[84] Treisman D. What have we learned about the causes of corruption from ten years of cross-national empirical research? Annual Review of Political

[85] Seldadyo H, DeHaan J. Is corruption really persistent? Pacific Economic

[86] Husted BW. Wealth, culture, and corruption. Journal of International Business Studies. 1999;**30**(2):339-360

[87] Svensson J. Eight questions about corruption. Journal of Economic Perspectives. 2005;**19**(3):19-42

[88] Moran J. Democratic transitions and forms of corruption. Crime, Law and Social Change. 2001;**36**:379-393

[89] Kotera G, Okada K, Samreth S. Government size, democracy, and corruption: An empirical

Science. 2007;**10**(1):211-244

Review. 2011;**16**(2):192-206

Studies. 2009;**45**(1):55-75

2013;**18**(2):290-303

2009;**42**(1):1-19

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

[79] Saha S, Gounder R, Je Su J. The interaction effect of economic freedom and democracy on corruption. Economics Letters. 2009;**105**(2):173-176

[80] Campbell N, Saha S. Corruption, democracy and Asia-Pacific countries. Journal of the Asia Pacific Economy. 2013;**18**(2):290-303

[81] Sun Y, Johnston M. Does democracy check corruption? Insights from China and India. Comparative Politics. 2009;**42**(1):1-19

[82] Rock MT. Corruption and democracy. Journal of Development Studies. 2009;**45**(1):55-75

[83] Lambsdorff JG, Cornelius P. Corruption, foreign investment and growth. In: Schwab LK, et al., editor. Competitiveness Report 2000/2001. World Economic Forum and the Institute for International Development. Oxford: Harvard University/Oxford University Press; 2000. pp. 70-78

[84] Treisman D. What have we learned about the causes of corruption from ten years of cross-national empirical research? Annual Review of Political Science. 2007;**10**(1):211-244

[85] Seldadyo H, DeHaan J. Is corruption really persistent? Pacific Economic Review. 2011;**16**(2):192-206

[86] Husted BW. Wealth, culture, and corruption. Journal of International Business Studies. 1999;**30**(2):339-360

[87] Svensson J. Eight questions about corruption. Journal of Economic Perspectives. 2005;**19**(3):19-42

[88] Moran J. Democratic transitions and forms of corruption. Crime, Law and Social Change. 2001;**36**:379-393

[89] Kotera G, Okada K, Samreth S. Government size, democracy, and corruption: An empirical

investigation. Economic Modelling. 2012;**29**(6):2340-2348

[90] Golden M. Sources of corruption in authoritarian Regimens. Social Science Quarterly. 2010;**91**(1):1-20

[91] Charron N. The impact of sociopolitical integration and press freedom on corruption. Journal of Development Studies. 2009;**45**(9):1472-1493

[92] Ensung H. Democracy and political corruption: A cross-national comparison. Crime, Law and Social Change. 2004;**41**:179-194

[93] Huntington S. Political Order in Changing Societies. New Haven: Yale University Press; 1968

[94] Porta D. Political parties and corruption: Ten hypotheses on five vicious circles. Crime, Law and Social Change. 2004;**42**:35-60

[95] Blake CH, Martin CG. The dynamics of political corruption: Re-examining the influence of democracy. Democratization. 2006;**13**(1):1-14

[96] Bhattacharyya S, Hodler R. Media freedom and democracy in the fight against corruption. European Journal of Political Economy. 2015;**39**:13-24

[97] Pellegata A. Constraining political corruption: An empirical analysis of the impact of democracy. Democratization. 2013;**20**(7):1195-1218

[98] Kalenborn C, Lessmann C. The impact of democracy and press freedom on corruption: Conditionality matters. Journal of Policy Modeling. 2013;**35**(6):857-886

[99] Schopf C. Deterring extortive corruption in Korea through democratization and the rule of law. Journal of Comparative Asian Development. 2015;**14**(2):279-318

[100] Drury AC, Krieckhaus J, Lusztig M. Corruption, democracy, and economic growth. International Political Science Review. 2006;**27**(2):121-136

[101] Shen C. Corruption, democracy, economic freedom, and state strength: A cross-National Analysis. International Journal of Comparative Sociology. 2005;**46**(4):327-345

[102] Färdigh MA. What's the Use of a Free Media? The Role of Media in Curbing Corruption and Promoting Quality of Government. Sweden: Ale Tryckteam AB, Bohus; 2013

[103] Kaufmann D, Vicente PC. Legal corruption. Economics and Politics. 2011;**23**(2):195-219

[104] Li H, Tang M, Huhe N. How does democracy influence citizens' perceptions of government corruption? A cross-national study. Democratization. 2015:1-27

[105] Manzetti L. Why do corrupt governments maintain public support? Comparative Political Studies. 2007;**40**(8):949-970

[106] Susan R-A. Political corruption and democracy. Journal of International Law. 1999;**14**(2):363-378

[107] Adsera A, Boix C, Payne M. Are you Being Served? Political Accountability and Quality of Government', Inter-American Development Bank Research Department Working Paper 438. Washington, DC; 2000

[108] Lederman D, Loayza NV, Soares RR. Accountability and corruption, political institution matter. Economics and Politics. 2005;**17**(1):1-35

[109] Moreno A. Corruption and democracy: A cultural assessment. Comparative Sociology. 2002;**1**(3-4): 495-507

[110] Levine D. The corrupt organization. Human Relations. 2005;**58**(6):723-740

[111] Goldin C, Lawrence K. Human capital and social capital: The rise of secondary schooling in America, 1910-1940. Journal of Interdisciplinary History. 1999;**29**:683-723

[112] Darden K. Resisting Occupation: Mass Literacy and the Creation of Durable National Loyalties. New York: Cambridge University Press; 2013

[113] Uslaner E. Corruption, Inequality, and the Rule of Law. New York: Cambridge University Press; 2008

[114] Hofstede G. Cultures and Organizations: Software of the Mind. New York: McGraw-Hill; 1991

[115] Shadabi L. The impact of religion on corruption. The Journal of Business Inquiry. 2013;**12**:102-117

[116] Swamy A et al. Gender and corruption. Journal of Development Economics. 2001;**64**:25-55

[117] Gatti R, Paternostro S, Rigolini J. Individual attitudes toward corruption: Do social effects matter? In: World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 3122. 2003

[118] Sandholtz W, Taagepera R. Corruption, culture, and communism. International Review of Sociology. 2007;**15**(1):109-131

[119] Johnston M. Corruption inequality, and change. In: Peter M, Ward H, editors. Corruption, Development, and Inequality: Soft Touch or Hard Graft. London/New York: Routledge; 1989. pp. 13-37

[120] Alam MS. A theory of limits on corruption and some applications. Kyklos. 1995;**48**:419-435

[121] Jongsung Y, Khagram S. A comparative study of Inequality and corruption. American Sociological Review. 2005;**70**:136-157

[122] Larraín F, Tavares J. Can Openness Deter Corruption? Unpublished

**33**

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants*

[133] Turner S. The dilemma of double standards in US human rights policy. Peace & Change. 2003;**28**(4):524-554

[134] Ortiz C. Does a double standard exist at the United Nations—A focus on Iraq, Israel and the Influence of the United States on the UN. Wisconsin International Law Journal. 2004;**22**:393

[135] Delbiondo K. Norms, Self-Interest and Effectiveness: Explaining Double Standards in EU Reactions to Violations of Democratic Principles in Sub-Saharan Africa. Centre for EU Studies, Ghent University; 2012. Available from: https://biblio.ugent.be/

[136] Rakauskienė OG, Ranceva O. Youth

unemployment and emigration trends. Intellectual Economics.

[137] Johnston M. What can be done about entrenched corruption? In: Annual World Bank Conference on Development Economics 1997. Washington DC, USA: World Bank;

[138] Elliott KA. Corruption as an international policy problem: Overview and recommendations. Corruption and the Global Economy. 1997;**175**:175-230

[139] Hanitzsch T et al. Modeling perceived influences on journalism: Evidence from a cross-national survey of journalists. Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly.

[140] Reese SD. Understanding the global journalist: A hierarchy-of-

[141] Hoover K, Donovan T. The Elements of Social Scientific Thinking.

Boston: Wadsworth; 2011

influences approach. Journalism Studies.

2010;**87**(1):5-22

2001;**2**(2):173-187

publication/4103883

2014;**8**(1):165-177

1998

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

Working Paper; Harvard University. 2000. Available from: http://www. iseg.utl.pt/departamentos/economia/ ecosemin/00\_01/t2000-08.pdf

[123] Warner C. Globalization and corruption. In: Ritzer G, editor. The Blackwell Companion to Globalization. USA: Blackwell Publishing; 2007

International Organization.

Practice. 2002;**11**(4):387-403

[128] Zakaria M. Openness and corruption: A time-series analysis. Zagreb International Review of

2004;**16**(6):851-861

2003;**57**(4):761-800

[124] Sandholtz W, Gray M. nternational integration and national corruption.

[125] Krueger A. The political economy of the rent-seeking society. The American Economic Review. 1974;**64**:291-303

[126] Torrez J. The effect of openness on corruption. The Journal of International Trade and Economic Development in

[127] Gatti R. Explaining corruption: Are open countries less corrupt? Journal of International Development.

Economics and Business. 2009;**12**(2):1-14

[129] Gokcekus O, Knörich J. Does quality of openness affect corruption? Economics Letters. 2006;**91**(2):190-196

[130] Treisman D. The causes of corruption: A cross-National Study. Journal of Public Economics.

[131] Lalountas DA, Manolas GA, Vavouras IS. Corruption, globalization and development: How are these three phenomena related? Journal of Policy

Modeling. 2011;**33**(4):636-648

Review. 2018;**19**(3):623-634

[132] Mukherjee D. Corruption in international business: Does economic globalization help? Global Business

2000;**76**:399-457

*Journalism and Corruption: Toward a Hierarchical Universal Theory of Determinants DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.93026*

Working Paper; Harvard University. 2000. Available from: http://www. iseg.utl.pt/departamentos/economia/ ecosemin/00\_01/t2000-08.pdf

[123] Warner C. Globalization and corruption. In: Ritzer G, editor. The Blackwell Companion to Globalization. USA: Blackwell Publishing; 2007

[124] Sandholtz W, Gray M. nternational integration and national corruption. International Organization. 2003;**57**(4):761-800

[125] Krueger A. The political economy of the rent-seeking society. The American Economic Review. 1974;**64**:291-303

[126] Torrez J. The effect of openness on corruption. The Journal of International Trade and Economic Development in Practice. 2002;**11**(4):387-403

[127] Gatti R. Explaining corruption: Are open countries less corrupt? Journal of International Development. 2004;**16**(6):851-861

[128] Zakaria M. Openness and corruption: A time-series analysis. Zagreb International Review of Economics and Business. 2009;**12**(2):1-14

[129] Gokcekus O, Knörich J. Does quality of openness affect corruption? Economics Letters. 2006;**91**(2):190-196

[130] Treisman D. The causes of corruption: A cross-National Study. Journal of Public Economics. 2000;**76**:399-457

[131] Lalountas DA, Manolas GA, Vavouras IS. Corruption, globalization and development: How are these three phenomena related? Journal of Policy Modeling. 2011;**33**(4):636-648

[132] Mukherjee D. Corruption in international business: Does economic globalization help? Global Business Review. 2018;**19**(3):623-634

[133] Turner S. The dilemma of double standards in US human rights policy. Peace & Change. 2003;**28**(4):524-554

[134] Ortiz C. Does a double standard exist at the United Nations—A focus on Iraq, Israel and the Influence of the United States on the UN. Wisconsin International Law Journal. 2004;**22**:393

[135] Delbiondo K. Norms, Self-Interest and Effectiveness: Explaining Double Standards in EU Reactions to Violations of Democratic Principles in Sub-Saharan Africa. Centre for EU Studies, Ghent University; 2012. Available from: https://biblio.ugent.be/ publication/4103883

[136] Rakauskienė OG, Ranceva O. Youth unemployment and emigration trends. Intellectual Economics. 2014;**8**(1):165-177

[137] Johnston M. What can be done about entrenched corruption? In: Annual World Bank Conference on Development Economics 1997. Washington DC, USA: World Bank; 1998

[138] Elliott KA. Corruption as an international policy problem: Overview and recommendations. Corruption and the Global Economy. 1997;**175**:175-230

[139] Hanitzsch T et al. Modeling perceived influences on journalism: Evidence from a cross-national survey of journalists. Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly. 2010;**87**(1):5-22

[140] Reese SD. Understanding the global journalist: A hierarchy-ofinfluences approach. Journalism Studies. 2001;**2**(2):173-187

[141] Hoover K, Donovan T. The Elements of Social Scientific Thinking. Boston: Wadsworth; 2011

**35**

**Chapter 2**

Study

**Abstract**

global countries.

Transparency International (TI)

**1.1 Background and definitions**

**1. Freedom of the press and corruption**

*Abdullah K. Al-Kindi*

Press Freedom and Corruption in

the GCC: Are There Better Future

Horizons? An Analytical-Critical

This study seeks to provide a critical analysis of press freedom and corruption scores in the six Arab countries under the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), as reported by two international nongovernmental organizations 2013–2017: (1) Freedom House (FH) and (2) Transparency International (TI). The researcher noted how some of the reports by these organizations continually connect between press freedom and corruption. The reading might help to improve the GCC states' future performances both in press freedom and fighting against corruption. Readings on press freedom and corruption are now more widely available in many international reports of a number of international organizations. Although standards for measuring the degree of both of them vary in these reports, they often agree on one outcome. Some of these reports have gradually gained prominence in good segments of public opinion and have become the subject of debate among intellectuals and journalists. Governments refrain from commenting on such reports particularly negative ones. However, the impact of such reports on the relevant governmental entities cannot be ignored when it comes to calibrating their practices and activities internationally and comparing them with other institutions in other regional and

**Keywords:** press freedom, corruption, GCC, Freedom House (FH),

"Freedom of expression" has a long history in human civilization, yet it is one of the problematic terms that has emerged in the history of mankind and is still in our contemporary life. The problematic aspect of this term, from my viewpoint, is not related to its intended meaning, but it relates to its interpretations and practices and to the way these practices are opposed to individual and institutional practices and laws. Universally, Article 19 of the United Nations Human Rights Declaration (UNHR) is widely considered as the main principle and reference of press and media freedom. Article 19 defined freedom of expression as: "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold

#### **Chapter 2**

## Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons? An Analytical-Critical Study

*Abdullah K. Al-Kindi*

### **Abstract**

This study seeks to provide a critical analysis of press freedom and corruption scores in the six Arab countries under the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), as reported by two international nongovernmental organizations 2013–2017: (1) Freedom House (FH) and (2) Transparency International (TI). The researcher noted how some of the reports by these organizations continually connect between press freedom and corruption. The reading might help to improve the GCC states' future performances both in press freedom and fighting against corruption. Readings on press freedom and corruption are now more widely available in many international reports of a number of international organizations. Although standards for measuring the degree of both of them vary in these reports, they often agree on one outcome. Some of these reports have gradually gained prominence in good segments of public opinion and have become the subject of debate among intellectuals and journalists. Governments refrain from commenting on such reports particularly negative ones. However, the impact of such reports on the relevant governmental entities cannot be ignored when it comes to calibrating their practices and activities internationally and comparing them with other institutions in other regional and global countries.

**Keywords:** press freedom, corruption, GCC, Freedom House (FH), Transparency International (TI)

#### **1. Freedom of the press and corruption**

#### **1.1 Background and definitions**

"Freedom of expression" has a long history in human civilization, yet it is one of the problematic terms that has emerged in the history of mankind and is still in our contemporary life. The problematic aspect of this term, from my viewpoint, is not related to its intended meaning, but it relates to its interpretations and practices and to the way these practices are opposed to individual and institutional practices and laws. Universally, Article 19 of the United Nations Human Rights Declaration (UNHR) is widely considered as the main principle and reference of press and media freedom. Article 19 defined freedom of expression as: "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold

opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers" [1].

Terminology wise, freedom of expression is considered as a political, economic, philosophical, and general moral concept with multiple and complex connotations, all of which require a certain level of identification and definition. There is freedom of religion, freedom of expression, freedom of information, freedom of press, freedom of trade, etc. In this context, the Encyclopedia of Politics defines freedom of expression as "the right of any citizen to express his/ her opinion in all public matters without any punishment, and it is guaranteed in the most democratic countries. Freedom of expression takes many different forms and frames, from writing to literary, to artistic freedom, thus including freedom of the press and the media" [2].

Definition of freedom of the press depends on the philosophy and concepts of freedom of expression but with more specific practical issues related to the field of media and its practitioners. Dictionary of Media and Communications defines freedom of the press as "freedom to publish anything without censorship before or after. Freedom of the press has been debated since modern printing began in the 1400s. Some governments place limits on this freedom, fearing the power of words to spur people to act against them" [3].

The freedom of the press is an important and debatable issue, and it is considered as one of the main international discourse worldwide today. UNESCO urges all member states to "promote the free flow of ideas by word and image," and since 1993 this international organization proclaimed third of March every year as "World Press Freedom Day" (WPFD) to enhance all developments related to freedom of the press [4].

From the researcher's point of view, the definition by Stevenson of the press freedom is a more rational and balanced one: "Freedom of the press is the right to speak, broadcast, or publish without prior restraint by or permission of the government, but with limited legal accountability after publication for violations of law. It may also encompass legal guarantees of (i) reasonable access to information about government, business, and people, (ii) a right of reply or correction, (iii) a limited right of access to the media, and (iv) some special protections for journalists [5].

The latest UNESCO report entitled "World Trends in Freedom of Expression and Media Development 2017/2018" focused on four main trends worldwide and how these trends affect freedom of expression and freedom of the press. The four trends are [6]:


In brief, the report confirms that freedom of the press and media is decreasing internationally even with some positive developments on the right of information accessibility. According to the UNESCO report, press pluralism is still limited worldwide, and types and degree of pressure which affect media and press independency were increased internationally [6].

In the course of pursuing freedom or achieving some of its degrees, nations and peoples have fought great battles, and individuals pay high prices. The struggle in this aspect is still open and continuous, because political, social, and cultural

**37**

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?…*

anywhere; it is the result of a constantly on-going struggle" [7].

or positively the degree of freedom granted to them.

second century BC in the Hammurabi Law [8].

tries and regions.

private gain" [10].

freedoms that were acceptable and satisfactory in a given period will not remain so in another time and in different contexts. A recent study published by Ronning on freedom of expression in Norway, which is classified as "free" in freedom of expression index according to many international reports, indicates that: "Freedom of speech is dependent on tolerance and that is not something that is a given. It is a tenet that must be constantly defended. Freedom of speech is not guaranteed

Freedom of the press and media is an important measure of the level and degree

of freedom of opinion and expression in any society. Freedom of the press and the media is usually linked to legislative and legal frameworks, policies governing media work, as well as the actual practices of journalism, newsrooms, and the nature of contents delivered to the audience. Because of that, it is possible to measure the level of freedom of the press and media by analyzing the legislative framework to determine the degree of freedom granted by these legislations to the various media and those who work in them. Also, it is possible to explore the attitudes of media professionals to identify practices and actions that affect negatively

Studies and reports by some international organizations on the freedom of the press are widely available. Although the criteria for measuring the degree of freedom of the press and the media vary in these reports, they often agree on one outcome. Some of these reports have gradually gained prominence in good segments of public opinion and have become the subject of discussion and debate among intellectuals, journalists, and media professionals. Governments refrain from commenting on such reports—especially the negative ones. However, the impact of such reports on the relevant government entities cannot be ignored when it comes to compare their practices and activities internationally with other coun-

As freedom of expression, corruption also is as old as humankind. According to some researchers, corruption was first mentioned or indicated indirectly in the

Tanzi argued that corruption is not a new phenomenon, but it became a more attractive issue than in the past because of several reasons including "increase of democratic governments and free and active media and the growing role of some nongovernmental organizations such as Transparency International in fighting corruption, etc." [9]. The World Bank president James Wolfensohn in 1996 described corruption as "cancer" and defined it as "the abuse of public or corporate office for

Begovic ([11], p. 2) describes corruption as: "Intentional on-compliance with arms'-length principles aimed at deriving some advantage for oneself or for related individuals from this behavior." Begovic listed three main types of corruption that normally include different levels and areas of corruption, and these are [11]:

1.Corruption for achieving or speeding up materialization of some specific right

2.Corruption that violates the legal rules or a very biased enforcement of the rules

These main types of corruption from my own perspective are wide and general

3. "State capture," a corruption that is aimed at changing the rules and regulations into rules and regulations that favor the interests of the corruptor

and under each resides many detailed and small corruption activities. I would argue that studying corruption both in public and private sectors will not be far

that the citizen or legal entity is entitled to corruption without theft

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

#### *Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

freedoms that were acceptable and satisfactory in a given period will not remain so in another time and in different contexts. A recent study published by Ronning on freedom of expression in Norway, which is classified as "free" in freedom of expression index according to many international reports, indicates that: "Freedom of speech is dependent on tolerance and that is not something that is a given. It is a tenet that must be constantly defended. Freedom of speech is not guaranteed anywhere; it is the result of a constantly on-going struggle" [7].

Freedom of the press and media is an important measure of the level and degree of freedom of opinion and expression in any society. Freedom of the press and the media is usually linked to legislative and legal frameworks, policies governing media work, as well as the actual practices of journalism, newsrooms, and the nature of contents delivered to the audience. Because of that, it is possible to measure the level of freedom of the press and media by analyzing the legislative framework to determine the degree of freedom granted by these legislations to the various media and those who work in them. Also, it is possible to explore the attitudes of media professionals to identify practices and actions that affect negatively or positively the degree of freedom granted to them.

Studies and reports by some international organizations on the freedom of the press are widely available. Although the criteria for measuring the degree of freedom of the press and the media vary in these reports, they often agree on one outcome. Some of these reports have gradually gained prominence in good segments of public opinion and have become the subject of discussion and debate among intellectuals, journalists, and media professionals. Governments refrain from commenting on such reports—especially the negative ones. However, the impact of such reports on the relevant government entities cannot be ignored when it comes to compare their practices and activities internationally with other countries and regions.

As freedom of expression, corruption also is as old as humankind. According to some researchers, corruption was first mentioned or indicated indirectly in the second century BC in the Hammurabi Law [8].

Tanzi argued that corruption is not a new phenomenon, but it became a more attractive issue than in the past because of several reasons including "increase of democratic governments and free and active media and the growing role of some nongovernmental organizations such as Transparency International in fighting corruption, etc." [9]. The World Bank president James Wolfensohn in 1996 described corruption as "cancer" and defined it as "the abuse of public or corporate office for private gain" [10].

Begovic ([11], p. 2) describes corruption as: "Intentional on-compliance with arms'-length principles aimed at deriving some advantage for oneself or for related individuals from this behavior." Begovic listed three main types of corruption that normally include different levels and areas of corruption, and these are [11]:


These main types of corruption from my own perspective are wide and general and under each resides many detailed and small corruption activities. I would argue that studying corruption both in public and private sectors will not be far

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers" [1].

of the press and the media" [2].

to spur people to act against them" [3].

freedom of the press [4].

trends are [6]:

1.Press and media freedom

2.Press and media pluralism

4.Journalists' safety

3.Press and media independency

dency were increased internationally [6].

opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and

Terminology wise, freedom of expression is considered as a political, economic, philosophical, and general moral concept with multiple and complex connotations, all of which require a certain level of identification and definition. There is freedom of religion, freedom of expression, freedom of information, freedom of press, freedom of trade, etc. In this context, the Encyclopedia of Politics defines freedom of expression as "the right of any citizen to express his/ her opinion in all public matters without any punishment, and it is guaranteed in the most democratic countries. Freedom of expression takes many different forms and frames, from writing to literary, to artistic freedom, thus including freedom

Definition of freedom of the press depends on the philosophy and concepts of freedom of expression but with more specific practical issues related to the field of media and its practitioners. Dictionary of Media and Communications defines freedom of the press as "freedom to publish anything without censorship before or after. Freedom of the press has been debated since modern printing began in the 1400s. Some governments place limits on this freedom, fearing the power of words

The freedom of the press is an important and debatable issue, and it is considered as one of the main international discourse worldwide today. UNESCO urges all member states to "promote the free flow of ideas by word and image," and since 1993 this international organization proclaimed third of March every year as "World Press Freedom Day" (WPFD) to enhance all developments related to

From the researcher's point of view, the definition by Stevenson of the press freedom is a more rational and balanced one: "Freedom of the press is the right to speak, broadcast, or publish without prior restraint by or permission of the government, but with limited legal accountability after publication for violations of law. It may also encompass legal guarantees of (i) reasonable access to information about government, business, and people, (ii) a right of reply or correction, (iii) a limited right of access to the media, and (iv) some special protections for journalists [5]. The latest UNESCO report entitled "World Trends in Freedom of Expression and Media Development 2017/2018" focused on four main trends worldwide and how these trends affect freedom of expression and freedom of the press. The four

In brief, the report confirms that freedom of the press and media is decreasing internationally even with some positive developments on the right of information accessibility. According to the UNESCO report, press pluralism is still limited worldwide, and types and degree of pressure which affect media and press indepen-

In the course of pursuing freedom or achieving some of its degrees, nations and

peoples have fought great battles, and individuals pay high prices. The struggle in this aspect is still open and continuous, because political, social, and cultural

**36**

from these main types. Media and journalists are normally attracted to reveal and publish about the corruption's activities, reflecting their role as society "watchdog."

Studies from different parts of the world examined the freedom of the press and levels of corruption, and most of them confirmed that the correlation is very strong between the high degree of freedom of the press and the reduction of corruption. A study by Starke et al. analyzed data for 157 countries in 10 years' time (2003–2013) to examine the impact of media freedom, Internet access, and governmental online service delivery on corruption. The study confirmed that free media play a vital role in curbing corruption, but the media role cannot be effective alone [12]. Another study by Mothasedi and Phiri, examined the correlation between mass media and corruption in South Africa and analyzed data of the "Corruption Perception Index" and the "World Press Freedom Index" in the period from 2002 to 2014. The most important conclusion of this study emphasized that "greater press freedom can lead to less corruption in South Africa but not vice versa" [13].

This study focuses on the relationship between the level of freedom of the press and the degree of corruption in six Arab member states and founders of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) since 1981: the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, and Kuwait. The Council's Primary Law consists of 22 articles, and the objectives stipulated in Article (4) include [14]:


Politically, the six GCC states are royal governments, and some of the ruling families in the region date back to the eighteenth century, as in the case of Oman. In addition, there is no real political opposition in the form of political parties except in the case of Bahrain, which turned into a constitutional monarchy allowing the establishment of the political parties since 2002.

The total population of the GCC states according to the latest statistics for 2018 is approximately 57.455.396 million: the United Arab Emirates (9,682,088), Bahrain (1,637,896), Saudi Arabia (34,140,662), Oman (5001.875), Qatar (2,743,901), and Kuwait (4,248,974) [15].

Media environment in the GCC states is very similar in terms of ownership, policies, and laws regulating media work and the most widespread practices, as well as contents. Governments in the GCC states have their own media outlets, such as newspapers, radio and TV stations, and electronic websites, but these governments also influence privately owned media through a set of rules and procedures that govern policies and content.

#### **1.2 Media as "watchdog"**

This study is based on its theoretical framework for understanding and interpreting the relationship between press freedom and corruption on the literatures of the theory of media social responsibility founded in the United States after World War II. The origins of this theory were based on a report by the Commission on the Freedom of the Press in 1947, which emphasized the notion of press freedom and for the first time added the concept of social responsibility, which meant press

**39**

interest.

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?…*

is free to report but at the same time it is socially responsible toward individuals,

1.A truthful, comprehensive, and intelligent account of the day's events in a

3.The projection of a representative picture of the constituent groups in the

4.The presentation and clarification of the goals and values of the society

This theory was an attempt to balance freedom of expression with the interests of society. One of the most important sources in this area is the book by Siebert et al. [18]. The book defined four theories that explain the interrelationships

between governments and the press: authoritarianism, liberalism, communism, and social responsibility. The four theories seem clear, but the fundamental distinction

Within the liberal theory, the press and the media are seen as an independent and free institution and should have full authority to inform the public about the activities of the society, government, and the various authorities in the society. In contrast, the press and the media within the authoritarian theory are used to support the political systems, the ruling elites, the authorities, or the various forces in society. Within this theory, the government or the executive authority has the right to decide who can or cannot use the press and other media, and therefore the freedom of the press expands or narrows according to the positions and desires of that authority. The media social responsibility theory represented a middle vision between the two theories of liberalism and authoritarianism. McQuail points out that media social responsibility theory

1.The media have obligations to society, and media ownership is a public trust.

2.News media should be truthful, accurate, fair, objective, and relevant.

5.Media should follow agreed codes of ethics and professional standards.

6.Under some circumstances, society may need to intervene in the public

Within the theory of social responsibility, an important theoretical concept is developed, namely, the "watchdog," which means that mass media monitors and reports all societal events that are going on in both directions: positively or negatively. Within this concept also, the media and its employees are seen as the "eyes" and "ears" of the audience and communities, and they reported all activities

The commission, which was headed by Robert M. Hutchins, identified the main

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

community, and deferent societal powers [16].

context which gives them meaning

5.Full access to the day's intelligence [17]

remains between liberal and authoritarian theories.

3.The media should provide a forum for ideas.

4.The media should be free but self-regulated.

is based on a set of principles, the most important of which are [19]:

society

requirements to practice a free and responsible press:

2.A forum for the exchange of comment and criticism

#### *Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

is free to report but at the same time it is socially responsible toward individuals, community, and deferent societal powers [16].

The commission, which was headed by Robert M. Hutchins, identified the main requirements to practice a free and responsible press:


This theory was an attempt to balance freedom of expression with the interests of society. One of the most important sources in this area is the book by Siebert et al. [18]. The book defined four theories that explain the interrelationships between governments and the press: authoritarianism, liberalism, communism, and social responsibility. The four theories seem clear, but the fundamental distinction remains between liberal and authoritarian theories.

Within the liberal theory, the press and the media are seen as an independent and free institution and should have full authority to inform the public about the activities of the society, government, and the various authorities in the society. In contrast, the press and the media within the authoritarian theory are used to support the political systems, the ruling elites, the authorities, or the various forces in society. Within this theory, the government or the executive authority has the right to decide who can or cannot use the press and other media, and therefore the freedom of the press expands or narrows according to the positions and desires of that authority. The media social responsibility theory represented a middle vision between the two theories of liberalism and authoritarianism. McQuail points out that media social responsibility theory is based on a set of principles, the most important of which are [19]:


Within the theory of social responsibility, an important theoretical concept is developed, namely, the "watchdog," which means that mass media monitors and reports all societal events that are going on in both directions: positively or negatively. Within this concept also, the media and its employees are seen as the "eyes" and "ears" of the audience and communities, and they reported all activities

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

to less corruption in South Africa but not vice versa" [13].

articles, and the objectives stipulated in Article (4) include [14]:

states in all fields in order to achieve unity between them

prevailing between their peoples in various fields

3.To formulate similar regulations in various fields

establishment of the political parties since 2002.

Kuwait (4,248,974) [15].

govern policies and content.

**1.2 Media as "watchdog"**

"watchdog."

from these main types. Media and journalists are normally attracted to reveal and publish about the corruption's activities, reflecting their role as society

This study focuses on the relationship between the level of freedom of the press and the degree of corruption in six Arab member states and founders of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) since 1981: the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, and Kuwait. The Council's Primary Law consists of 22

1.To affect coordination, integration, and interconnection between member

2.To deepen and strengthen relations, links, and areas of cooperation now

Politically, the six GCC states are royal governments, and some of the ruling families in the region date back to the eighteenth century, as in the case of Oman. In addition, there is no real political opposition in the form of political parties except in the case of Bahrain, which turned into a constitutional monarchy allowing the

The total population of the GCC states according to the latest statistics for 2018 is approximately 57.455.396 million: the United Arab Emirates (9,682,088), Bahrain (1,637,896), Saudi Arabia (34,140,662), Oman (5001.875), Qatar (2,743,901), and

Media environment in the GCC states is very similar in terms of ownership, policies, and laws regulating media work and the most widespread practices, as well as contents. Governments in the GCC states have their own media outlets, such as newspapers, radio and TV stations, and electronic websites, but these governments also influence privately owned media through a set of rules and procedures that

This study is based on its theoretical framework for understanding and interpreting the relationship between press freedom and corruption on the literatures of the theory of media social responsibility founded in the United States after World War II. The origins of this theory were based on a report by the Commission on the Freedom of the Press in 1947, which emphasized the notion of press freedom and for the first time added the concept of social responsibility, which meant press

Studies from different parts of the world examined the freedom of the press and levels of corruption, and most of them confirmed that the correlation is very strong between the high degree of freedom of the press and the reduction of corruption. A study by Starke et al. analyzed data for 157 countries in 10 years' time (2003–2013) to examine the impact of media freedom, Internet access, and governmental online service delivery on corruption. The study confirmed that free media play a vital role in curbing corruption, but the media role cannot be effective alone [12]. Another study by Mothasedi and Phiri, examined the correlation between mass media and corruption in South Africa and analyzed data of the "Corruption Perception Index" and the "World Press Freedom Index" in the period from 2002 to 2014. The most important conclusion of this study emphasized that "greater press freedom can lead

**38**

#### *Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

and events of the society and its various forces with great care, sensitivity, and independence.

One researcher identified some mechanisms by which journalism practices the watchdog role, which includes [20]:


If the theory of social responsibility is the most appropriate theoretical framework for understanding the relationship between freedom of the press and fighting corruption in this study, the question remains: Does journalism and the media in the GCC countries exercise their functions according to this theory? Or do media and journalism in this region work under a different theoretical framework?

#### **2. Methodological framework**

#### **2.1 Problem statement**

This chapter analyzes the relationship between the degrees of freedom of the press and corruption in six Arab countries, namely, the GCC member states: the United Arab Emirates, the Kingdom of Bahrain, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the Sultanate of Oman, Kuwait, and Qatar, according to reports published by two international nongovernmental organizations—Freedom House (FH) and Transparency International (TI). The chapter provides a critical reading on the relationship between press freedom and corruption in the abovementioned countries as reported by the two international organizations in 5 years' time (2013–2017). The researcher did not include 2018 because at the time of writing this study, the Freedom House Report of 2018 had not yet been issued.

The researcher does not aim to achieve new detection or reading and analysis of what is unknown to researchers and interested peoples, but the study is a kind of brainstorming to stir more discussion and positive dialogue in two issues of great importance in the world in general and in the Arab World in particular. The study could also provide practical and effective ideas on how to deal with these two issues in the future to improve the performance of these countries in the freedom of the press and the fight against corruption.

#### **2.2 Research importance**

The importance of this study is highly related to the nature of both freedom of the press and corruption that present nowadays an important discourse locally, regionally, and internationally. Both freedom of the press and corruption are leading to serious discussions about their importance in influencing the image of any

**41**

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?…*

organizations regarding freedom of the press and corruption.

reported by the FH in the last 5 years (2013–2017)?

by the IT in the past 5 years (2013–2017)?

countries in the last 5 years (2013–2017)?

state and the efficiency of its various institutions. The critical reading by this study might provide a better understanding of the working mechanisms of international

1.What are the degrees of press freedom in the six Arab GCC countries as

2.What are the degrees of corruption in the six Arab GCC countries as reported

3.What are the main themes and topics of the FH reports on the six Arab GCC

4.What is the correlation between press freedom and corruption as reported by the FH and IT in the six Arab GCC countries in the last 5 years

This study depends on qualitative content analysis of the FH reports on freedom

This section of the study provides answers to the study questions based on a qualitative reading of the reports by two international organizations on press freedom and corruption in the six Arab GCC countries in the last 5 years

**Table 1** shows the scores of the press freedom in the GCC countries in the last 5 years (2013–2017), according to Freedom House reports. The organization normally grants three types of status on press freedom: free, partly free, and not free. The results in **Table 1** indicate that the press in five GCC countries is classified as not free opposite to only one country: Kuwait which is classified as partially free. Statistically, the results confirm that press in 83% of the GCC countries is not free (five out of six countries) compared to 17% which is partly free (one of six countries). The results reflect the similarity of political, social, and cultural values and principles adopted by these countries. On the political aspect, these countries are inherited rule

of the press in the six Arab GCC countries in the last 5 years (2013–2017). The analysis will identify the issues and topics these reports focused on to provide a close picture of the press freedom in these countries. Before the qualitative analysis, however, statistical indications on press freedom and corruption in the six Arab GCC states will be presented hereafter. The researcher chose the reports of the following international nongovernmental organizations in the areas of press freedom

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

**2.3 Research questions**

(2013–2017)?

and corruption:

**2.4 Research methodology**

1.Freedom House (FH) [21]

(2013–2017), as follows:

**3.1 Freedom of the press in the GCC**

2.Transparency International (TI) [22]

**3. Freedom of the press/corruption in the GCC**

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

state and the efficiency of its various institutions. The critical reading by this study might provide a better understanding of the working mechanisms of international organizations regarding freedom of the press and corruption.

#### **2.3 Research questions**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

independence.

advocate

watchdog role, which includes [20]:

1.Holding institutions accountable

5.Implementing newsroom ethics codes

**2. Methodological framework**

**2.1 Problem statement**

6.Separating between editorial and advertising

Freedom House Report of 2018 had not yet been issued.

press and the fight against corruption.

**2.2 Research importance**

2.Looking after audience interests first and foremost

3.Encouraging interaction and feedback from audience

and events of the society and its various forces with great care, sensitivity, and

One researcher identified some mechanisms by which journalism practices the

4.Practicing "watchdog" on itself through an in-house ombudsman or readers'

If the theory of social responsibility is the most appropriate theoretical framework for understanding the relationship between freedom of the press and fighting corruption in this study, the question remains: Does journalism and the media in the GCC countries exercise their functions according to this theory? Or do media and

This chapter analyzes the relationship between the degrees of freedom of the press and corruption in six Arab countries, namely, the GCC member states: the United Arab Emirates, the Kingdom of Bahrain, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the Sultanate of Oman, Kuwait, and Qatar, according to reports published by two international nongovernmental organizations—Freedom House (FH) and Transparency International (TI). The chapter provides a critical reading on the relationship between press freedom and corruption in the abovementioned countries as reported by the two international organizations in 5 years' time (2013–2017). The researcher did not include 2018 because at the time of writing this study, the

The researcher does not aim to achieve new detection or reading and analysis of what is unknown to researchers and interested peoples, but the study is a kind of brainstorming to stir more discussion and positive dialogue in two issues of great importance in the world in general and in the Arab World in particular. The study could also provide practical and effective ideas on how to deal with these two issues in the future to improve the performance of these countries in the freedom of the

The importance of this study is highly related to the nature of both freedom of the press and corruption that present nowadays an important discourse locally, regionally, and internationally. Both freedom of the press and corruption are leading to serious discussions about their importance in influencing the image of any

journalism in this region work under a different theoretical framework?

**40**


#### **2.4 Research methodology**

This study depends on qualitative content analysis of the FH reports on freedom of the press in the six Arab GCC countries in the last 5 years (2013–2017). The analysis will identify the issues and topics these reports focused on to provide a close picture of the press freedom in these countries. Before the qualitative analysis, however, statistical indications on press freedom and corruption in the six Arab GCC states will be presented hereafter. The researcher chose the reports of the following international nongovernmental organizations in the areas of press freedom and corruption:


#### **3. Freedom of the press/corruption in the GCC**

This section of the study provides answers to the study questions based on a qualitative reading of the reports by two international organizations on press freedom and corruption in the six Arab GCC countries in the last 5 years (2013–2017), as follows:

#### **3.1 Freedom of the press in the GCC**

**Table 1** shows the scores of the press freedom in the GCC countries in the last 5 years (2013–2017), according to Freedom House reports. The organization normally grants three types of status on press freedom: free, partly free, and not free.

The results in **Table 1** indicate that the press in five GCC countries is classified as not free opposite to only one country: Kuwait which is classified as partially free. Statistically, the results confirm that press in 83% of the GCC countries is not free (five out of six countries) compared to 17% which is partly free (one of six countries). The results reflect the similarity of political, social, and cultural values and principles adopted by these countries. On the political aspect, these countries are inherited rule

states under the rule of certain families. The GCC states are totalitarian regimes despite development efforts that have covered many areas including the establishment of parliaments and representative institutions. However, these development efforts need longer periods of time and ongoing reforms in order to achieve more objectives and goals. Bahrain has represented a different political experience among the countries in the GCC region as it is considered the only Gulf state that allowed the formation of political parties since 2002. However, this exclusivity did not help Bahrain achieve better levels of freedom of press. Freedom House reports for the years 2013–2017 indicate that press freedom in Bahrain is the weakest among the six Arab GCC states. On the other hand, Kuwait has benefited from its political and parliamentary experience and the level of political freedom in achieving a better degree in freedom of the press. Freedom House has classified it as partially free for 5 consecutive years 2013–2017.

From a sociocultural perspective, the GCC societies are described as traditional or conservative societies, despite the Internet-led information revolution that reaches the highest level in the Middle East. The latest Internet statistics for 2017 indicated that the percentage of Internet users in the GCC countries are as follows: UAE (94.82%), Bahrain (95.88%), Saudi Arabia (82.12%), Oman (80.19%), Qatar (95.94%), and Kuwait (98%) [23].

From the researcher's point of view, the GCC societies are currently living in a state of great contradiction between the traditional conservative society with which they have long been associated and the open society through the Internet and the search engines. These societies are also contradicted between how they are living in real and direct realms and practices in the virtual world. These contradictions should be studied by sociologists, media, and cultural experts to understand many transformations occurring in the GCC societies.

As mentioned in **Table 1**, reports indicate that the level of freedom of the press in the GCC countries is more of a stable status. In a country like Oman, the score of press freedom was 71 in five consecutive reports 2013–2017. The degree of press freedom in Kuwait in 5 years ranged between 59 and 60. On the other hand, there is a situation of negative development in the levels of freedom of the press in most of the Gulf states, according to FH reports in 2013–2017, even if these developments are slight and inconceivable. These states of stability and negative developments in the levels of press freedom in the GCC states can be interpreted by more than one explanation: first, the lack of practical actions is taken by both governments and media professionals in these countries to increase and develop their levels of press freedom, and second, this may also be related to the ignorance of the concerned entities in these countries, governments, or civil society organizations, with these international reports and their observations. Many governmental and private institutions in a number of Arab countries tend to underestimate the importance and usefulness of


#### **Table 1.**

*Press freedom scores (2013–2017) in the GCC according to FH (points 0–100), the lowest is more free and the highest is not free.*

**43**

statistics.

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?…*

these reports and sometimes even describe them as conspiracy reports on countries

It should be noted here that the six Arab GCC states that this study focused on belong to a larger political, sociocultural, and geographical framework, namely, the Arab World or the so-called today in many international reports Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Freedom House reports in the last 5 years (2013–2017) covered 17 Arab countries, including the 6 Arab GCC states. Press in only 5 out of 17 countries in this region is classified as "partially free," namely, Kuwait, Lebanon,

It is clear that the levels of freedom of the press in the Arab countries, according to FH reports, are generally weak, as no Arab country has achieved until today the level of "free" press. Although this does not justify the decrease in the press freedom level in the GCC states as indicated in **Table 1**, it is important to understand that the GCC countries are part of the Arab World and share many political, social,

But the researcher believes that the conditions of the GCC states, their political experience, economic capabilities, and development projects, are different and could enable them to achieve better levels of freedom of expression in general and

Cooperation Council in 1981 and were the only regional system in the Arab world after the Arab League, which has a limited number of members and managed to survive until today compared to some other regional councils in the Arab world which were formed but did not last. On the economic aspect, the GCC states have enormous economic potential, as these countries produce almost 32% of the world's oil and export 45% from the total amount worldwide. GCC states represent 30% of the world oil [24]. Both political and economic capabilities of the GCC states have

**Table 2** shows the degrees of corruption in the six GCC Arab as reported by

Figures in **Table 2** indicate that four out of six Arab GCC states suffer from corruption according to TI in the last 5 years (2013–2017), as Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Oman, and Kuwait did not reach even 50 degrees of a scale consisting of 100 degrees in 5 consecutive years; and the best average for these four countries in the

While Oman maintained its low level of transparency in the last 5 years' reports, Bahrain and Kuwait fell in 2016 and 2017, and Saudi Arabia's position slightly improved in 2017. It is surprising that reports in the last 5 years as seen in **Table 2** show the low results achieved by Kuwait annually, despite the fact that this country is the only country in this region having more open political and media environment than the others. It is enough to recall many debates and controversial issues raised by the Kuwait's parliament and the Kuwaiti media. This can be further explained by more of a deep analysis of the themes and topics focused on by the TI reports on Kuwait and other GCC countries—as will be done in the next section of the analysis—to understand the whole picture and go beyond these numbers and

In contrast, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar scored more than 50 points of the total score out of 100 in the last 5 years (2013–2017), with averages that reached 69 for the UAE and 66 for Qatar. More important, the two GCC states achieved

On the political aspect, the six Arab GCC states established the Gulf

helped to launch large-scale development projects in these countries.

Transparency International in the last 5 years (2013–2017).

last 5 years was 48 points in Saudi Arabia.

advanced positions in the last 2 years' reports of TI.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

and are used to put more pressure on them.

Morocco, Tunisia, and Jordan.

economic, and cultural conditions.

freedom of the press in particular.

**3.2 Corruption in the GCC**

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

these reports and sometimes even describe them as conspiracy reports on countries and are used to put more pressure on them.

It should be noted here that the six Arab GCC states that this study focused on belong to a larger political, sociocultural, and geographical framework, namely, the Arab World or the so-called today in many international reports Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Freedom House reports in the last 5 years (2013–2017) covered 17 Arab countries, including the 6 Arab GCC states. Press in only 5 out of 17 countries in this region is classified as "partially free," namely, Kuwait, Lebanon, Morocco, Tunisia, and Jordan.

It is clear that the levels of freedom of the press in the Arab countries, according to FH reports, are generally weak, as no Arab country has achieved until today the level of "free" press. Although this does not justify the decrease in the press freedom level in the GCC states as indicated in **Table 1**, it is important to understand that the GCC countries are part of the Arab World and share many political, social, economic, and cultural conditions.

But the researcher believes that the conditions of the GCC states, their political experience, economic capabilities, and development projects, are different and could enable them to achieve better levels of freedom of expression in general and freedom of the press in particular.

On the political aspect, the six Arab GCC states established the Gulf Cooperation Council in 1981 and were the only regional system in the Arab world after the Arab League, which has a limited number of members and managed to survive until today compared to some other regional councils in the Arab world which were formed but did not last. On the economic aspect, the GCC states have enormous economic potential, as these countries produce almost 32% of the world's oil and export 45% from the total amount worldwide. GCC states represent 30% of the world oil [24]. Both political and economic capabilities of the GCC states have helped to launch large-scale development projects in these countries.

#### **3.2 Corruption in the GCC**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

states under the rule of certain families. The GCC states are totalitarian regimes despite development efforts that have covered many areas including the establishment of parliaments and representative institutions. However, these development efforts need longer periods of time and ongoing reforms in order to achieve more objectives and goals. Bahrain has represented a different political experience among the countries in the GCC region as it is considered the only Gulf state that allowed the formation of political parties since 2002. However, this exclusivity did not help Bahrain achieve better levels of freedom of press. Freedom House reports for the years 2013–2017 indicate that press freedom in Bahrain is the weakest among the six Arab GCC states. On the other hand, Kuwait has benefited from its political and parliamentary experience and the level of political freedom in achieving a better degree in freedom of the press. Freedom House has classified it as partially free for 5 consecutive years 2013–2017.

From a sociocultural perspective, the GCC societies are described as traditional

From the researcher's point of view, the GCC societies are currently living in a state of great contradiction between the traditional conservative society with which they have long been associated and the open society through the Internet and the search engines. These societies are also contradicted between how they are living in real and direct realms and practices in the virtual world. These contradictions should be studied by sociologists, media, and cultural experts to understand many

As mentioned in **Table 1**, reports indicate that the level of freedom of the press in the GCC countries is more of a stable status. In a country like Oman, the score of press freedom was 71 in five consecutive reports 2013–2017. The degree of press freedom in Kuwait in 5 years ranged between 59 and 60. On the other hand, there is a situation of negative development in the levels of freedom of the press in most of the Gulf states, according to FH reports in 2013–2017, even if these developments are slight and inconceivable. These states of stability and negative developments in the levels of press freedom in the GCC states can be interpreted by more than one explanation: first, the lack of practical actions is taken by both governments and media professionals in these countries to increase and develop their levels of press freedom, and second, this may also be related to the ignorance of the concerned entities in these countries, governments, or civil society organizations, with these international reports and their observations. Many governmental and private institutions in a number of Arab countries tend to underestimate the importance and usefulness of

**No Country 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 AVG. Status** Bahrain 86 87 87 87 87 87 Not free United Arab Emirates 74 76 76 78 78 76 Not free Saudi Arabia 84 83 83 86 86 84 Not free Oman 71 71 71 71 71 71 Not free Qatar 67 67 67 69 70 68 Not free Kuwait 59 59 59 59 60 59 Partly free

*Press freedom scores (2013–2017) in the GCC according to FH (points 0–100), the lowest is more free and the* 

or conservative societies, despite the Internet-led information revolution that reaches the highest level in the Middle East. The latest Internet statistics for 2017 indicated that the percentage of Internet users in the GCC countries are as follows: UAE (94.82%), Bahrain (95.88%), Saudi Arabia (82.12%), Oman (80.19%), Qatar

(95.94%), and Kuwait (98%) [23].

transformations occurring in the GCC societies.

**42**

**Table 1.**

*highest is not free.*

**Table 2** shows the degrees of corruption in the six GCC Arab as reported by Transparency International in the last 5 years (2013–2017).

Figures in **Table 2** indicate that four out of six Arab GCC states suffer from corruption according to TI in the last 5 years (2013–2017), as Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Oman, and Kuwait did not reach even 50 degrees of a scale consisting of 100 degrees in 5 consecutive years; and the best average for these four countries in the last 5 years was 48 points in Saudi Arabia.

While Oman maintained its low level of transparency in the last 5 years' reports, Bahrain and Kuwait fell in 2016 and 2017, and Saudi Arabia's position slightly improved in 2017. It is surprising that reports in the last 5 years as seen in **Table 2** show the low results achieved by Kuwait annually, despite the fact that this country is the only country in this region having more open political and media environment than the others. It is enough to recall many debates and controversial issues raised by the Kuwait's parliament and the Kuwaiti media. This can be further explained by more of a deep analysis of the themes and topics focused on by the TI reports on Kuwait and other GCC countries—as will be done in the next section of the analysis—to understand the whole picture and go beyond these numbers and statistics.

In contrast, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar scored more than 50 points of the total score out of 100 in the last 5 years (2013–2017), with averages that reached 69 for the UAE and 66 for Qatar. More important, the two GCC states achieved advanced positions in the last 2 years' reports of TI.


#### **Table 2.**

*Corruption scores (2013–2017) in the GCC according to TI (points 0–100).*

The UAE ranked No. 24 in the 2016 report out of 176 countries covered by the report, and Qatar ranked 31 in the same year. In 2017, the two countries improved their positions globally. The UAE ranked 21 among 180 countries and Qatar ranked 29 in the same report. These are important and encouraging results for other GCC states and even for the Arab countries to benefit from the experience of the two countries and their levels in reducing cases of corruption.

**Table 3** shows the ranking of 18 Arab countries in 2016 and 2017 reports by the TI in order to understand the context the GCC countries.

The six Arab GCC countries achieved good levels in combatting corruption compared to other Arab countries, especially in the 2016 report by TI. The 2016 report included 18 Arab countries of which the six Arab GCC countries scored among the top seven Arab countries. Although all the Arab countries in the report, with the exception of UAE and Qatar, scored 50 points out of 100 according to the TI, the GCC states were in a better position than 11 other Arab countries included in that report.

It should be noted that the very weak scores of combatting corruption in countries such as Syria, Yemen, and Libya (173, 170, 170, respectively) are closely related to the state of war and the long standing of political and social instability. However, other Arab countries are not suffering from wars and living a more stable situation but have lagged behind the world rankings in Transparency International in 2016 report, such as Morocco, which scored 90, Algeria 108, Egypt at the same position, and Lebanon 136 globally.

In a 2017 report, which also included 18 Arab countries, Kuwait and Bahrain fell to eighth and ninth places among other Arab countries, although their global ranking is generally weak. Kuwait ranked 85 and Bahrain ranked 103 globally. It should be mentioned here that these negative indicators of corruption in the Arab countries are only stated to understand the context in which the six Arab GCC countries belong to, but not to justify the poor scores achieved by most GCC countries internationally. According to TI reports, the best Arab experiences are the UAE and Qatar, which belong to the GCC states and share with the rest of the countries of this region many characteristics and political, economic, social, and cultural conditions. Therefore, there is nothing to prevent other Gulf countries from achieving better scores in the fight against corruption in the international context.

#### **3.3 Main themes and topics in the GCC press freedom reports**

Analysis in this section will reveal the main themes and topics that were highlighted by the FH reports on the Arab GCC countries in the last 5 years (2013–2017). **Table 4** summarizes the main themes and topics addressed by these reports in each country in this region.

**45**

**Table 3.**

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?…*

**No Country 2016 rank 2017 rank** United Arab Emirates 24 21 Qatar 31 29 Saudi Arabia 57 57 Jordan 62 59 Oman 64 68 Bahrain 70 103 Kuwait 75 85 Tunisia 75 74 Morocco 90 81 Algeria 108 112 Egypt 108 117 Lebanon 136 143 Mauretania 142 143 Iraq 166 169 Libya 170 171 Sudan 170 175 Yemen 170 175 Syria 173 178

FH reports in the last 5 years (2013–2017) addressed many themes and topics of press freedom in the six Arab GCC states. Most of these themes and topics were

1.Criticism of Islam, rulers, ruling families, and governments and carrying out

2.Physical and psychological violence and arrests of journalists and bloggers who

The abovementioned themes were repeated in the FH reports on freedom of the press in the six Arab GCC states over the past 5 years (2013–2017). FH reports focused on specific cases that occurred in these countries when referring, for example, to the arrest or torture of journalists in this country or that. Examples of cases of censorship and control of the media in the GCC states were also reported. FH considered the control of governments in these countries or ruling families or individuals who have direct relationships with these systems as evidence of control

FH reports on press freedom in the GCC states indicate that the Internet provides important options for accessing information and exchanging views on many issues and that the spread and penetration of the Internet in these countries are

similar with few exceptions. Similar topics include:

criticize governments and ruling regimes

over the media, even if they are privately owned.

3.Control of local and international publications

of acts that threaten national security

*Arab countries' corruption ranks (2016–2017) according to TI.*

4.Control of the private media

5.Intensified Internet censorship

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*


*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

#### **Table 3.**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

**No Country 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 AVG. Status** Bahrain 48 49 51 43 36 45 Corrupted United Arab Emirates 69 70 70 66 71 69 Partly corrupted Saudi Arabia 46 49 52 46 49 48 Corrupted Oman 47 45 45 45 44 45 Corrupted Qatar 68 69 71 61 63 66 Partly corrupted Kuwait 43 44 49 41 39 43 Corrupted

The UAE ranked No. 24 in the 2016 report out of 176 countries covered by the report, and Qatar ranked 31 in the same year. In 2017, the two countries improved their positions globally. The UAE ranked 21 among 180 countries and Qatar ranked 29 in the same report. These are important and encouraging results for other GCC states and even for the Arab countries to benefit from the experience of the two

**Table 3** shows the ranking of 18 Arab countries in 2016 and 2017 reports by the

In a 2017 report, which also included 18 Arab countries, Kuwait and Bahrain fell to eighth and ninth places among other Arab countries, although their global ranking is generally weak. Kuwait ranked 85 and Bahrain ranked 103 globally. It should be mentioned here that these negative indicators of corruption in the Arab countries are only stated to understand the context in which the six Arab GCC countries belong to, but not to justify the poor scores achieved by most GCC countries internationally. According to TI reports, the best Arab experiences are the UAE and Qatar, which belong to the GCC states and share with the rest of the countries of this region many characteristics and political, economic, social, and cultural conditions. Therefore, there is nothing to prevent other Gulf countries from achieving

better scores in the fight against corruption in the international context.

Analysis in this section will reveal the main themes and topics that were highlighted by the FH reports on the Arab GCC countries in the last 5 years (2013–2017). **Table 4** summarizes the main themes and topics addressed by these reports in each

**3.3 Main themes and topics in the GCC press freedom reports**

The six Arab GCC countries achieved good levels in combatting corruption compared to other Arab countries, especially in the 2016 report by TI. The 2016 report included 18 Arab countries of which the six Arab GCC countries scored among the top seven Arab countries. Although all the Arab countries in the report, with the exception of UAE and Qatar, scored 50 points out of 100 according to the TI, the GCC states were in a better position than 11 other Arab countries included in that report. It should be noted that the very weak scores of combatting corruption in countries such as Syria, Yemen, and Libya (173, 170, 170, respectively) are closely related to the state of war and the long standing of political and social instability. However, other Arab countries are not suffering from wars and living a more stable situation but have lagged behind the world rankings in Transparency International in 2016 report, such as Morocco, which scored 90, Algeria 108, Egypt at the same position,

countries and their levels in reducing cases of corruption.

*Corruption scores (2013–2017) in the GCC according to TI (points 0–100).*

*The lowest is more corrupted and the highest is not corrupted.*

**Table 2.**

TI in order to understand the context the GCC countries.

and Lebanon 136 globally.

**44**

country in this region.

*Arab countries' corruption ranks (2016–2017) according to TI.*

FH reports in the last 5 years (2013–2017) addressed many themes and topics of press freedom in the six Arab GCC states. Most of these themes and topics were similar with few exceptions. Similar topics include:


The abovementioned themes were repeated in the FH reports on freedom of the press in the six Arab GCC states over the past 5 years (2013–2017). FH reports focused on specific cases that occurred in these countries when referring, for example, to the arrest or torture of journalists in this country or that. Examples of cases of censorship and control of the media in the GCC states were also reported. FH considered the control of governments in these countries or ruling families or individuals who have direct relationships with these systems as evidence of control over the media, even if they are privately owned.

FH reports on press freedom in the GCC states indicate that the Internet provides important options for accessing information and exchanging views on many issues and that the spread and penetration of the Internet in these countries are


**47**

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?…*

3.Penalties for criticizing Islam

Information

informational

*Topics and themes of the press freedom in the GCC according to FH (2013–2017).*

high, as mentioned earlier in this chapter. However, the Internet, according to the FH reports, is subject to "constant," "tight," and "intensive" control and censorship. FH generally uses these provisions in many reports without presenting specific cases or examples. When attempting to bring the picture closer to such censorship, it cites cases of cybercriminals or activists who have been arrested or charged as a result of publishing in the media or disseminating info through social media.

6 Kuwait 1.Shutdowns of opposition media outlets and Twitter microblog accounts

and statements calling for the overthrow of the regime

6.Screens all imported media for morally offensive content

2.Forbids criticism of the Emir, the disclosure of secret or private information,

4.All publishers are required to obtain an operating license from the Ministry of

5.Monitor Internet communications for defamation and security threats

7. Controls the publication and distribution of all materials classified as

FH repeatedly emphasized that themes of "criticism of Islam, regimes, governments, and threats to national security" are affecting press freedom in these countries. The researcher believes that criticizing Islam to achieve better levels of press freedom is out of context or at least does not reflect a good and deep understanding of how the states and societies in this region are structured. In these countries Islam is a comprehensive life system and an essential component in the national constitutions. Furthermore, the sociocultural framework in these societies often does not accept the reference to the Islamic religion in a negative or critical manner, and those who dare to do so are heavily attacked by official institutions, societies, and even ordinary individuals. Islam is a very sensitive and restricted theme in this region and cannot be compared easily with other themes. Societies and individuals in this region, in my point of view, can be more flexible and tolerant when criticizing ruling families, governments, regimes, etc., but not Islam or Islamic Law. Reports by FH also criticized some administrative procedures related to media and press institutions as well as to professional practices in this field. FH considered pursuing license to practice journalism from official bodies as an obstacle to freedom of the press. However, such procedures have taken their legal validity from laws issued in these countries, and therefore their implementation is not considered an offense. Civil society associations and individuals could criticize these frameworks and call to change or improve them, but it would not be possible to accept a violation of explicit legal provisions on the grounds that this would establish better press freedom. The FH reports on the GCC states in the last 5 years, 2013–2017, focused on themes related to specific countries in this region. For example, reports mentioned "self-censorship" in Oman and Qatar and how this kind of censorship negatively affects the freedom of the press. In practicing this kind of censorship, journalists and media establishments avoid addressing many issues because they are very sensi-

tive and might impact negatively both on journalists and their institutions.

The FH reports have also mentioned how the press and media coverage sometimes ignore coverage of some local events and even some geographical areas like in Saudi Arabia and Qatar because of written or oral directives. Reports indicated the phenomenon of harassment of foreign journalists in Qatar and the UAE by subjecting their news stories and articles to intensive supervision. Punishments

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

**Table 4.**

**No Country Main topics and themes**

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*


**Table 4.**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

1 Bahrain 1.Violent repression against journalists and bloggers (beatings, arrest, and

4.Close newspapers through court proceedings

6.Shutting down the opposition publications

9. Significant control over private publications

7. Internet heavily monitored 8.Restricting international media

foreign governments

affiliations

1.Arresting activists and bloggers 2.Limiting media environment

6.Online censorship is extensive

permissible media coverage

4.Monitors and blocks websites 5.Physical harassment of journalists 6.Difficulty covering the local news

ated with the royal family 8.Controls news and information 9.Arrests of regime critics 4 Oman 1.Censored and subdued media environment

Ministry of Culture and Information

or abuses a person's dignity or rights 3.Activists and bloggers were fined and sentenced 4.Journalists are required to obtain licenses to practice

both domestic and foreign media

5 Qatar 1.Journalists are subject to prosecution for criticizing government, the ruling

5. Self-censorship is reportedly widespread

2.All publications are subject to government licensing 3.Censor domestic and foreign publications

6.Ignoring some important local events and accidents 7. Local reporters often receive warnings and threats

7. Self-censorship is widespread 8.Considerable control over the Internet

4.Online content is censored

family, or Islam

associates

actions that undermine state security

2.Imprisonment for publishing criticism of Islam or the king and inciting nine

3.Censor and prevent the distribution of local and foreign publications

3.Censor both domestic and foreign publications prior to distribution 4.Prohibits criticism of the government, rulers and ruling families, and friendly

7. Local journalists suffered from warnings and threats if they push the limits of

9.Most media outlets are either government owned or have close government

2.Jurisdiction over the media was transferred from the court system to the

3.Banning of news that contradicts Sharia (Islamic law), undermines national security, promotes foreign interests, or slanders religious leaders

7. All daily newspapers are privately owned but controlled by individuals affili-

2.Journalists can be fined or imprisoned for voicing criticism of the Sultan or printing material that leads to "public discord, violates the security of the state,

5.Censor any material regarded as politically, culturally, or sexually offensive in

6.Blacklisted several authors and specific books that were deemed controversial

8.Noncitizen journalists receive termination, deportation, and imprisonment 9. Seven newspapers are owned by members of the ruling family or their business

9.Blocks websites deemed sexually offensive or politically controversial

5.Intensifying censorship on stories by foreign journalists,

8.Noncitizen journalists face dismissal and deportation

1.Prohibits publishing materials that harm national security

5.Ban books and films, block websites, and prosecute individuals

**No Country Main topics and themes**

2 United Arab Emirates

3 Saudi Arabia torture)

**46**

*Topics and themes of the press freedom in the GCC according to FH (2013–2017).*

high, as mentioned earlier in this chapter. However, the Internet, according to the FH reports, is subject to "constant," "tight," and "intensive" control and censorship. FH generally uses these provisions in many reports without presenting specific cases or examples. When attempting to bring the picture closer to such censorship, it cites cases of cybercriminals or activists who have been arrested or charged as a result of publishing in the media or disseminating info through social media.

FH repeatedly emphasized that themes of "criticism of Islam, regimes, governments, and threats to national security" are affecting press freedom in these countries. The researcher believes that criticizing Islam to achieve better levels of press freedom is out of context or at least does not reflect a good and deep understanding of how the states and societies in this region are structured. In these countries Islam is a comprehensive life system and an essential component in the national constitutions. Furthermore, the sociocultural framework in these societies often does not accept the reference to the Islamic religion in a negative or critical manner, and those who dare to do so are heavily attacked by official institutions, societies, and even ordinary individuals. Islam is a very sensitive and restricted theme in this region and cannot be compared easily with other themes. Societies and individuals in this region, in my point of view, can be more flexible and tolerant when criticizing ruling families, governments, regimes, etc., but not Islam or Islamic Law.

Reports by FH also criticized some administrative procedures related to media and press institutions as well as to professional practices in this field. FH considered pursuing license to practice journalism from official bodies as an obstacle to freedom of the press. However, such procedures have taken their legal validity from laws issued in these countries, and therefore their implementation is not considered an offense. Civil society associations and individuals could criticize these frameworks and call to change or improve them, but it would not be possible to accept a violation of explicit legal provisions on the grounds that this would establish better press freedom.

The FH reports on the GCC states in the last 5 years, 2013–2017, focused on themes related to specific countries in this region. For example, reports mentioned "self-censorship" in Oman and Qatar and how this kind of censorship negatively affects the freedom of the press. In practicing this kind of censorship, journalists and media establishments avoid addressing many issues because they are very sensitive and might impact negatively both on journalists and their institutions.

The FH reports have also mentioned how the press and media coverage sometimes ignore coverage of some local events and even some geographical areas like in Saudi Arabia and Qatar because of written or oral directives. Reports indicated the phenomenon of harassment of foreign journalists in Qatar and the UAE by subjecting their news stories and articles to intensive supervision. Punishments

for those who are not obeying rules and directives include termination of contracts and sometimes deportation from the country without proper procedures. However, these reports sometimes refer to one single event or avoid referring to any particular names or events in which foreign journalists have been punished without appropriate procedures, thus referring to this subject in a general form that lacks more evidence, which are not available in these reports.

One of the topics in which these reports singled out a country was Saudi Arabia in the issue of transformation of media accountability from courts to the Ministry of Culture and Information, in a way that negatively affects press freedom. The researcher believes that the opposite is happening in many countries worldwide, including some Arab countries that transformed the administrative accountability to the court system. In the court system, journalists and media establishments should feel more confident because the judiciary institution is more independent and trusted. In contrast, the administrative accountability is conducted by official entities supervising media and journalism establishments. Administrative accountability is not in journalists and media's favor because it is most likely affected by the conflict of interests between different institutions especially the public sector.

The researcher noted that the content of FH reports on freedom of the press in the GCC states in the last 5 years, 2013–2017, is repeated, and some of these reports of successive years are identically similar, and the differences were minor between them year after year. The reports focus on the elements and frameworks of legal, environment, political, and economic systems and address the topics under each of these frameworks and related observations. Repeatedly, FH considers that the legal framework governing media and press in these countries negatively affects freedom of the press. FH successive reports also indicate that the practices of the executive bodies in these countries within the political framework are another factor affecting press freedom. The researcher believes that focusing on specific issues and referring to them repeatedly year after year may help the concerned countries deal easily with them. Countries and related institutions can read and analyze these reports and take appropriate action to improve the level of freedom of the press. States may also provide clarifications and "corrections," if they are available, on some information provided by FH reports.

In its reports on freedom of the press in the last 5 years (2013–2017), FH has classified Kuwaiti press as "partially free," with only four Arab countries, namely, Tunisia, Lebanon, Morocco, and Jordan. FH reported a number of positive signs on press freedom in Kuwait, as follows [25]:


**49**

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?…*

These positive signs on press freedom in Kuwait in the last 5 years' (2013–2017)

Second, the researcher also found that some of the positive signs made by FH reports on press freedom in Kuwait have a suitable and similar ground in other GCC states. The private sector in these countries owns the largest proportion of daily newspapers, so these newspapers can imitate the Kuwaiti press practices and methodology in dealing with public affairs issues in more independent and objective ways. Institutions that supervise media and press institutions in these countries can also be encouraged to benefit from the positive indicators reported by the FH on the Kuwaiti press to improve the levels of press freedom in the rest of the GCC

reports by FH are very important in many respects. First, Kuwait shares many political, economic, social, and cultural characteristics with other GCC states, which can therefore use these positive signs to achieve better scores on the scale of

**3.4 Relationship between press freedom and corruption in the GCC states**

The correlation between press freedom and corruption in GCC states was measured by using two techniques, statistical and un-statistical ones. **Table 5** presents—statistically—the Pearson correlation coefficients between press freedom and corruption for each country. It is very clear that no significant correlation is found between the two variables for all countries, except for Qatar. For Oman, the correlation cannot be computed as one of the variables has constant values (press

The absence of a statistical strong correlation coefficient between the two variables, as shown in **Table 5** between the degrees of freedom of the press and level of corruption in the GCC states, can be due to multiple reasons. First, the set of data under analysis is small, covering only 5 years, considering that statistical analysis is more effective with a big set of data. Second, the similarities obtained by countries in this study and the frequency of the same result year after year, whether in the field of freedom of the press or in the field of corruption, do not help to detect a strong or clear correlation coefficient between the variables. The most prominent example of this is Oman, in which correlation between the two variables cannot be detected statistically because it has obtained a score of 71 in the freedom of the

But the indicators provided by the two international organizations on freedom

According to the figures in **Table 6**, the six Arab GCC states can be divided into

1.Countries in which the correlation between the decline in press freedom and high levels of corruption has been consistent (Oman, Bahrain, and Saudi

2.Countries in which the correlation between the decline in press freedom and

3.Countries in which the relationship between the medium level of freedom of the press and the high level of corruption (Kuwait) has been contradicted

of the press and corruption indicate that there are un-statistical correlations between the two variables freedom of the press and corruption in three out of six countries in this region. **Table 6** summarizes, un-statistically, the relationship between press freedom and corruption in the six Arab GCC countries, according to

two international organizations, FH and TI, in the last 5 years (2013–2017).

low levels of corruption has been contradicted (UAE and Qatar)

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

the world press freedom.

countries.

freedom).

press for 5 consecutive years.

three main categories:

Arabia)

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

These positive signs on press freedom in Kuwait in the last 5 years' (2013–2017) reports by FH are very important in many respects. First, Kuwait shares many political, economic, social, and cultural characteristics with other GCC states, which can therefore use these positive signs to achieve better scores on the scale of the world press freedom.

Second, the researcher also found that some of the positive signs made by FH reports on press freedom in Kuwait have a suitable and similar ground in other GCC states. The private sector in these countries owns the largest proportion of daily newspapers, so these newspapers can imitate the Kuwaiti press practices and methodology in dealing with public affairs issues in more independent and objective ways. Institutions that supervise media and press institutions in these countries can also be encouraged to benefit from the positive indicators reported by the FH on the Kuwaiti press to improve the levels of press freedom in the rest of the GCC countries.

#### **3.4 Relationship between press freedom and corruption in the GCC states**

The correlation between press freedom and corruption in GCC states was measured by using two techniques, statistical and un-statistical ones. **Table 5** presents—statistically—the Pearson correlation coefficients between press freedom and corruption for each country. It is very clear that no significant correlation is found between the two variables for all countries, except for Qatar. For Oman, the correlation cannot be computed as one of the variables has constant values (press freedom).

The absence of a statistical strong correlation coefficient between the two variables, as shown in **Table 5** between the degrees of freedom of the press and level of corruption in the GCC states, can be due to multiple reasons. First, the set of data under analysis is small, covering only 5 years, considering that statistical analysis is more effective with a big set of data. Second, the similarities obtained by countries in this study and the frequency of the same result year after year, whether in the field of freedom of the press or in the field of corruption, do not help to detect a strong or clear correlation coefficient between the variables. The most prominent example of this is Oman, in which correlation between the two variables cannot be detected statistically because it has obtained a score of 71 in the freedom of the press for 5 consecutive years.

But the indicators provided by the two international organizations on freedom of the press and corruption indicate that there are un-statistical correlations between the two variables freedom of the press and corruption in three out of six countries in this region. **Table 6** summarizes, un-statistically, the relationship between press freedom and corruption in the six Arab GCC countries, according to two international organizations, FH and TI, in the last 5 years (2013–2017).

According to the figures in **Table 6**, the six Arab GCC states can be divided into three main categories:


*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

evidence, which are not available in these reports.

press freedom in Kuwait, as follows [25]:

maintain bureaus in Kuwait.

independent, and diverse in their reporting.

newspapers.

evident.

houses.

for those who are not obeying rules and directives include termination of contracts and sometimes deportation from the country without proper procedures. However, these reports sometimes refer to one single event or avoid referring to any particular names or events in which foreign journalists have been punished without appropriate procedures, thus referring to this subject in a general form that lacks more

One of the topics in which these reports singled out a country was Saudi Arabia in the issue of transformation of media accountability from courts to the Ministry of Culture and Information, in a way that negatively affects press freedom. The researcher believes that the opposite is happening in many countries worldwide, including some Arab countries that transformed the administrative accountability to the court system. In the court system, journalists and media establishments should feel more confident because the judiciary institution is more independent and trusted. In contrast, the administrative accountability is conducted by official entities supervising media and journalism establishments. Administrative accountability is not in journalists and media's favor because it is most likely affected by the conflict of interests between different institutions especially the public sector.

The researcher noted that the content of FH reports on freedom of the press in the GCC states in the last 5 years, 2013–2017, is repeated, and some of these reports of successive years are identically similar, and the differences were minor between them year after year. The reports focus on the elements and frameworks of legal, environment, political, and economic systems and address the topics under each of these frameworks and related observations. Repeatedly, FH considers that the legal framework governing media and press in these countries negatively affects freedom of the press. FH successive reports also indicate that the practices of the executive bodies in these countries within the political framework are another factor affecting press freedom. The researcher believes that focusing on specific issues and referring to them repeatedly year after year may help the concerned countries deal easily with them. Countries and related institutions can read and analyze these reports and take appropriate action to improve the level of freedom of the press. States may also provide clarifications and "corrections," if they are available, on some information provided by FH reports. In its reports on freedom of the press in the last 5 years (2013–2017), FH has classified Kuwaiti press as "partially free," with only four Arab countries, namely, Tunisia, Lebanon, Morocco, and Jordan. FH reported a number of positive signs on

1.Censorship in practice does not regularly interfere with or restrict access to news.

2.Kuwaiti media are more critical and outspoken than many others in the region.

4.Atmosphere of increased governmental intolerance toward critical reporting is

5.International news is widely available, and a number of foreign media outlets

6.All Arabic and English language newspapers are privately owned, largely

7.Private media have relatively transparent ownership and their own press

3.More in-depth reporting and a greater diversity of opinions appear in

**48**

Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and Oman represent the worst case in the region, although it is a normal and predictable situation, because it reflects a kind of consistency between press freedom decline, and corruption levels rise according to international reports. In these countries, the press is not allowed to play its role in fighting corruption. It is not possible to claim that the press is a decisive factor in reducing levels of corruption. Media and press involvement in fighting corruption can send very important messages to the public about how serious and transparent these countries are in dealing with various corruption issues.

The countries of the second category, namely, the UAE and Qatar, represent an incomprehensible contradiction between the decline in press freedom and the decline in levels of corruption. This contradiction can be interpreted in many ways. This contradiction shows that there is no correlation between press freedom and the rise or fall of corruption levels and therefore the two issues should not be linked. Although this interpretation is important, it does not seem logic in comparison to situations around the world, where the relationship is always inverse between the high degree of press freedom and low levels of corruption. In addition, TI corruption reports focus on media as one of the main themes in corruption, whether it concerns the media itself or the role of these media in dealing with corruption issues.

The third category of the GCC states, represented only by Kuwait, also shows another contradictory relationship between freedom of the press and levels of corruption. FH categorized Kuwaiti press as "partially free," but corruption levels, according to TI reports, are very high internationally. This discrepancy between the degree of freedom of the press and the level of corruption may reflect the absence of a relationship between both issues. It might also reflect a kind of disability to invest Kuwait's success in the field of press freedom in fighting corruption and confronting it, especially since the Kuwaiti press has a stronger and better influence than other Arab GCC countries.

In general, the researcher believes that the GCC countries in the second and third categories that posed a kind of contradictory relationship between freedom of the press and the levels of corruption are important examples that should be supported and benefited from. Countries' experiences that have achieved advanced regional and international levels in the fight against corruption, namely, the UAE and Qatar, should be used and imitated by other GCC states in order to improve their stance in fighting against corruption. Meanwhile, UAE and Qatar should be encouraged to improve their performance of press freedom regionally and internationally. Kuwait is the only GCC state that has achieved better press freedom, so other GCC countries should benefit from this experience and make use of many important positive signs on press freedom in Kuwait as mentioned above, to improve press freedom in all GCC states. Nevertheless, Kuwait should also improve its situation in fighting against corruption regionally and internationally.


#### **Table 5.**

*Pearson Correlation Coefficients between Press Freedom and Corruption Scores (2013-2017) in the GCC according to FH and TI.*

**51**

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?…*

**No Country Press freedom Corruption**

**2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 Status 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 Status**

84 83 83 86 86 Not free 46 49 52 46 49 Corrupted

corrupted

corrupted

43 44 49 41 39 Corrupted

1 Bahrain 86 87 87 87 87 Not free 48 49 51 43 36 Corrupted 2 UAE 74 76 76 78 78 Not free 69 70 70 66 71 Partly

4 Oman 71 71 71 71 71 Not free 47 45 45 45 44 Corrupted 5 Qatar 67 67 67 69 70 Not free 68 69 71 61 63 Partly

free

GCC countries with good performances and best practices in press freedom (Kuwait) and regional and international records in fighting against corruption (UAE and Qatar) can be viewed favorably with the hope that the freedom of the press and the fight against corruption in the GCC region can be improved in the future. To achieve this task, both legislative frameworks and practical actions should be considered and implemented in both areas: press freedom and fighting against corruption, thus benefiting from successful experiences and best practices

*Relationship between press freedom and corruption scores (2013–2017) in the GCC according to FH and TI.*

The results of this study confirmed the weakness of the freedom enjoyed by the mass media in GCC countries except for Kuwait, where media is classified in a number of international reports, including the FH report as "partially free," while the media in the rest of the GCC countries classify as "not free" over successive years. The weakness of freedom of the mass media in this region is linked to a number of reasons, perhaps dominated by the control of political systems over the media through the laws and regulations. Political systems also directly or indirectly finance and own mass media institutions. These mechanisms of control by political regimes in the GCC countries are also applied by many regimes in the rest of the Arab countries and many third world countries as well. By applying these mechanisms of control, governments want to be sure to use media in achieving their goals and interests and avoid any kind of interference by the media against policies and

The political systems in the GCC states recognize that ensuring better or greater freedom of mass media can transform the media into an independent and influential force on many policies and decisions relevant to people and communities. From a political and organizational point of view, many of the mass media in the GCC states remained official and governmental, even if they were private in terms of ownership. Mass media outlets in this region are linked to the governments and political systems in mutually beneficial interests. They control the mass media to avoid criticism or at least ensure media "silence" and "neutrality." On the other hand, the mass media has always benefited from the financial support provided by governments and political systems in many different forms, including periodic subsidies,

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

6 Kuwait 59 59 59 59 60 Partly

3 Saudi Arabia

**Table 6.**

regionally and internationally.

**4. Results and discussion**

programs approved by these governments.

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*


**Table 6.**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

these countries are in dealing with various corruption issues.

Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and Oman represent the worst case in the region, although it is a normal and predictable situation, because it reflects a kind of consistency between press freedom decline, and corruption levels rise according to international reports. In these countries, the press is not allowed to play its role in fighting corruption. It is not possible to claim that the press is a decisive factor in reducing levels of corruption. Media and press involvement in fighting corruption can send very important messages to the public about how serious and transparent

The countries of the second category, namely, the UAE and Qatar, represent an incomprehensible contradiction between the decline in press freedom and the decline in levels of corruption. This contradiction can be interpreted in many ways. This contradiction shows that there is no correlation between press freedom and the rise or fall of corruption levels and therefore the two issues should not be linked. Although this interpretation is important, it does not seem logic in comparison to situations around the world, where the relationship is always inverse between the high degree of press freedom and low levels of corruption. In addition, TI corruption reports focus on media as one of the main themes in corruption, whether it concerns the media itself or the role of these media in dealing with corruption issues. The third category of the GCC states, represented only by Kuwait, also shows another contradictory relationship between freedom of the press and levels of corruption. FH categorized Kuwaiti press as "partially free," but corruption levels, according to TI reports, are very high internationally. This discrepancy between the degree of freedom of the press and the level of corruption may reflect the absence of a relationship between both issues. It might also reflect a kind of disability to invest Kuwait's success in the field of press freedom in fighting corruption and confronting it, especially since the Kuwaiti press has a stronger and better influence than other Arab GCC countries. In general, the researcher believes that the GCC countries in the second and third categories that posed a kind of contradictory relationship between freedom of the press and the levels of corruption are important examples that should be supported and benefited from. Countries' experiences that have achieved advanced regional and international levels in the fight against corruption, namely, the UAE and Qatar, should be used and imitated by other GCC states in order to improve their stance in fighting against corruption. Meanwhile, UAE and Qatar should be encouraged to improve their performance of press freedom regionally and internationally. Kuwait is the only GCC state that has achieved better press freedom, so other GCC countries should benefit from this experience and make use of many important positive signs on press freedom in Kuwait as mentioned above, to improve press freedom in all GCC states. Nevertheless, Kuwait should also improve

its situation in fighting against corruption regionally and internationally.

*Indicates the correlation is significant at 0.05 significant level.*

**No. Country Correlation coefficient Sig.** Bahrain −0.241 0.696 UAE −0.186 0.764 Saudi Arabia −0.512 0.378 Oman NA NA Qatar −0.880\* 0.049 Kuwait −0.623 0.262

*Pearson Correlation Coefficients between Press Freedom and Corruption Scores (2013-2017) in the GCC* 

**50**

*\**

**Table 5.**

*according to FH and TI.*

*Relationship between press freedom and corruption scores (2013–2017) in the GCC according to FH and TI.*

GCC countries with good performances and best practices in press freedom (Kuwait) and regional and international records in fighting against corruption (UAE and Qatar) can be viewed favorably with the hope that the freedom of the press and the fight against corruption in the GCC region can be improved in the future. To achieve this task, both legislative frameworks and practical actions should be considered and implemented in both areas: press freedom and fighting against corruption, thus benefiting from successful experiences and best practices regionally and internationally.

#### **4. Results and discussion**

The results of this study confirmed the weakness of the freedom enjoyed by the mass media in GCC countries except for Kuwait, where media is classified in a number of international reports, including the FH report as "partially free," while the media in the rest of the GCC countries classify as "not free" over successive years.

The weakness of freedom of the mass media in this region is linked to a number of reasons, perhaps dominated by the control of political systems over the media through the laws and regulations. Political systems also directly or indirectly finance and own mass media institutions. These mechanisms of control by political regimes in the GCC countries are also applied by many regimes in the rest of the Arab countries and many third world countries as well. By applying these mechanisms of control, governments want to be sure to use media in achieving their goals and interests and avoid any kind of interference by the media against policies and programs approved by these governments.

The political systems in the GCC states recognize that ensuring better or greater freedom of mass media can transform the media into an independent and influential force on many policies and decisions relevant to people and communities. From a political and organizational point of view, many of the mass media in the GCC states remained official and governmental, even if they were private in terms of ownership. Mass media outlets in this region are linked to the governments and political systems in mutually beneficial interests. They control the mass media to avoid criticism or at least ensure media "silence" and "neutrality." On the other hand, the mass media has always benefited from the financial support provided by governments and political systems in many different forms, including periodic subsidies,

#### *Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

advertisements, subscriptions, and tax exemptions. Accordingly, the freedom of the press in GCC states and elsewhere in many Arab countries is always weak.

As the fight against different types of corruption through the media needs a better and stronger level of freedom, the media failed to play its role in fighting corruption or reported it to the public except in exceptional cases passed through to achieve certain agendas or goals: political, social, or for sending some international messages abroad. To illustrate this, one can argue that although there are high levels of corruption in many GCC countries, as reported by TI, corruption cases are absent and rarely raised in many mass media in the region. The researcher believes that the weakness of the role played by mass media in fighting against corruption is linked to a traditional vision in these countries that confrontations against corruption must be held in closed rooms and take its way to the institutions of justice rather than become a public opinion issue through the media. This vision reflects the attitude toward mass media outlets, which are seen in these countries as means and tools of development. According to this traditional view, authoritarian theory is the most suitable framework by which to interpret media practice in the region.

Mass media in the GCC states were—and still are—a force controlled by the political systems in these countries. The researcher argues that if the media continues to practice its duties under the full control of the political systems, it will be very difficult to predict future positive changes in the media environment, policies, and content in this region. Mass media institutions are always in need of high degrees of independence and freedom to enable them to objectively consider and report on various authorities within the community, including the executive authority. The question that can be raised here is how the traditional mass media in the GCC countries can consider and deal with issues of corruption independently, as the media in this region follows the executive authorities or are under its control. Moreover, the issues of corruption are linked to authorities, institutions, and individuals, so another question is how mass media can take independent positions from these authorities while it's practicing its role under the control of these authorities.

The researcher argues that the low ratings of the freedom of the mass media in most GCC states, according to FH reports, have led—and will always be—to high levels of corruption in these countries as confirmed by TI reports. The political systems and governments in these countries decided not to use media outlets in combating corruption. The decision is mainly political and media in this region always obey the controlling power. In order to change that situation, there must be structural changes of the mass media environments in these countries. There must be also some important and powerful initiatives from the mass media institutions to practice and play their roles as independent powers.

The new media, particularly social media, carry better future hopes to practice pressure on two directions. In the first direction, these networks can operate as a pressure force on traditional mass media to deal with some sensitive and mostly avoided issues such as corruption. In the second direction, the new media can put some pressure on governments to take more vigorous measures in dealing with corruption and involve the public in such issues. Although there are no scientific studies—as far as the researcher is aware—which confirm such analogy, the researcher believes that through follow-up and continuous direct observation, social media in this region is putting real pressures in the two directions referred to above.

#### **5. Conclusion**

The results of this study confirmed the correlation between the low levels of freedom of the press and the high level of corruption in most GCC countries, namely,

**53**

**Author details**

Abdullah K. Al-Kindi

Sultan Qaboos University, Oman

provided the original work is properly cited.

\*Address all correspondence to: abujude2006@gmail.com

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?…*

fifth in the level of corruption among the six GCC states.

contribute to the fight against corruption.

the fight against corruption in this region.

Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and Oman. But the study also pointed a contradictory result between the degrees of freedom of press and levels of corruption in some of these countries. While the press and the media in countries such as the UAE and Qatar are classified as "not free" according to FH reports, the two countries have advanced global ranks in the fight against corruption as reported by TI. This result on one hand can be seen as proof that there is no kind of correlation between the freedom of the press and fighting against corruption. On the other hand, this result may be used positively to encourage the two countries to improve their level of freedom of the press to enhance their international positions in the fight against corruption.

Another contradictory finding in this study also was related to the freedom of the press in Kuwait, which according to FH is classified as "partly free," while the level of corruption is very high compared to other GCC countries. Kuwait is ranked

Based on these results, it is necessary to think in the future of more analytical studies on the relationship between the media systems in the GCC countries and corruption. There is also a need for a comparative analysis of the degree of attention given by the media in the GCC countries to the corruption issues and the type of cases covered. Moreover, studies are needed on the investigative journalism in these countries and types of the issues that are exposed in this kind of journalism that can

Issues of corruption should also be considered in the future as they are reported and portrayed by social media in this region. Such studies, however, will provide more information and better understanding on the relationship between the freedom of the press and corruption in the GCC states and clarify whether there will be better future horizons for the relationship between freedom of the press and

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

#### *Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and Oman. But the study also pointed a contradictory result between the degrees of freedom of press and levels of corruption in some of these countries. While the press and the media in countries such as the UAE and Qatar are classified as "not free" according to FH reports, the two countries have advanced global ranks in the fight against corruption as reported by TI. This result on one hand can be seen as proof that there is no kind of correlation between the freedom of the press and fighting against corruption. On the other hand, this result may be used positively to encourage the two countries to improve their level of freedom of the press to enhance their international positions in the fight against corruption.

Another contradictory finding in this study also was related to the freedom of the press in Kuwait, which according to FH is classified as "partly free," while the level of corruption is very high compared to other GCC countries. Kuwait is ranked fifth in the level of corruption among the six GCC states.

Based on these results, it is necessary to think in the future of more analytical studies on the relationship between the media systems in the GCC countries and corruption. There is also a need for a comparative analysis of the degree of attention given by the media in the GCC countries to the corruption issues and the type of cases covered. Moreover, studies are needed on the investigative journalism in these countries and types of the issues that are exposed in this kind of journalism that can contribute to the fight against corruption.

Issues of corruption should also be considered in the future as they are reported and portrayed by social media in this region. Such studies, however, will provide more information and better understanding on the relationship between the freedom of the press and corruption in the GCC states and clarify whether there will be better future horizons for the relationship between freedom of the press and the fight against corruption in this region.

#### **Author details**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

press in GCC states and elsewhere in many Arab countries is always weak.

advertisements, subscriptions, and tax exemptions. Accordingly, the freedom of the

As the fight against different types of corruption through the media needs a better and stronger level of freedom, the media failed to play its role in fighting corruption or reported it to the public except in exceptional cases passed through to achieve certain agendas or goals: political, social, or for sending some international messages abroad. To illustrate this, one can argue that although there are high levels of corruption in many GCC countries, as reported by TI, corruption cases are absent and rarely raised in many mass media in the region. The researcher believes that the weakness of the role played by mass media in fighting against corruption is linked to a traditional vision in these countries that confrontations against corruption must be held in closed rooms and take its way to the institutions of justice rather than become a public opinion issue through the media. This vision reflects the attitude toward mass media outlets, which are seen in these countries as means and tools of development. According to this traditional view, authoritarian theory is the most suitable framework by which to interpret media practice in the region. Mass media in the GCC states were—and still are—a force controlled by the political systems in these countries. The researcher argues that if the media continues to practice its duties under the full control of the political systems, it will be very difficult to predict future positive changes in the media environment, policies, and content in this region. Mass media institutions are always in need of high degrees of independence and freedom to enable them to objectively consider and report on various authorities within the community, including the executive authority. The question that can be raised here is how the traditional mass media in the GCC countries can consider and deal with issues of corruption independently, as the media in this region follows the executive authorities or are under its control. Moreover, the issues of corruption are linked to authorities, institutions, and individuals, so another question is how mass media can take independent positions from these authorities while it's practicing its role under the control of these authorities.

The researcher argues that the low ratings of the freedom of the mass media in most GCC states, according to FH reports, have led—and will always be—to high levels of corruption in these countries as confirmed by TI reports. The political systems and governments in these countries decided not to use media outlets in combating corruption. The decision is mainly political and media in this region always obey the controlling power. In order to change that situation, there must be structural changes of the mass media environments in these countries. There must be also some important and powerful initiatives from the mass media institutions to

The new media, particularly social media, carry better future hopes to practice pressure on two directions. In the first direction, these networks can operate as a pressure force on traditional mass media to deal with some sensitive and mostly avoided issues such as corruption. In the second direction, the new media can put some pressure on governments to take more vigorous measures in dealing with corruption and involve the public in such issues. Although there are no scientific studies—as far as the researcher is aware—which confirm such analogy, the researcher believes that through follow-up and continuous direct observation, social media in

The results of this study confirmed the correlation between the low levels of freedom of the press and the high level of corruption in most GCC countries, namely,

this region is putting real pressures in the two directions referred to above.

practice and play their roles as independent powers.

**52**

**5. Conclusion**

Abdullah K. Al-Kindi Sultan Qaboos University, Oman

\*Address all correspondence to: abujude2006@gmail.com

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

### **References**

[1] United Nations Human Rights Declaration, Article 19. Available from: http://www.un.org/en/ [Accessed: 20 January 2019]

[2] Kayali A. Politics Encyclopedia (Seven Volume). Vol. 2nd. Beirut: Arab Institution for Studies and Publishing; 1985. p. 247

[3] Danesi M. Dictionary of Media and Communications. New York, London, England: M.E. Sharpe Armonk; 2009. p. 128

[4] UNESCO World Press Freedom. Available from: http://www.unesco.org [Accessed: 20 January 2019]

[5] Stevenson RL. Global Communication in the Twenty-First Century. London: Longman Pub Group; 1994. pp. 120-121

[6] UNESCO. World Trends in Freedom of Expression and Media Development 2017/2018. Global Report-Executive Summary; 2017. Available from: http:// ar.unesco.org/world-media-trend [Accessed: 15 February 2019]

[7] Ronning H. Freedom of expression is not a given right. Nordicom Information. 2013;**3-4**(35):3-13. Available from: http://www.nordicom. gu.se/.pdf [Accessed: 10 January 2019]

[8] Brioschi C. Corruption: A Short History. Washington: The Brookings Institution; 2017. Available from: https://www.brookings.edu/.pdf [Accessed: 10 January 2019]

[9] Tanzi V. Corruption around the World: Causes, Consequences, Scopes, and Cures. International Monetary Fund (IMF); 1998. Available from: https://www.IMF.org/External/Pubs/ FT/WP/PDF [Accessed: 20 January 2019]

[10] World Bank. Corruption. 2005. Available from: http://siteresources. worldbank.org/EXTABOUTUS/ Resources/Corruption.pdf [Accessed: 15 February 2019]

[11] Begovic B. Corruption: Concepts, types, causes and consequences. 2005. Available at: https://www.researchgate. net/publication/265364211 [Accessed: 15 February 2019]

[12] Starke C, Naab TK, Scherer H. Free to expose corruption: The impact of media freedom, internet access, and governmental online service delivery on corruption. International Journal of Communication. 2016;**10**:4702-4722

[13] Mothasedi N, Phiri A. The effects of mass media on corruption in South Africa: A MTAR-TEC Perspective. 2015. Available from: http://mpra.ub.unimuenchen.de/64338/ MPRA Paper No. 64338/PDF [Accessed: 10 January 2019]

[14] GCC Primary Law. 1981. Available from: http://www.gcc-sg.org [Accessed: 20 January 2019]

[15] Worldometers. World Population. 2018. Available from: http://www. worldometers.info/world-population/ population-by-country/ [Accessed: 10 February 2019]

[16] McQuail D. Mass Communication Theory. Third ed. London: Sage Publications Ltd; 1994. p. 124

[17] A Free and Responsible Press Details. pp. 20-29 Available at: https://archive.org/ afreeandresponsiblepressdetails/ in.ernet.dli.2015.211705/page/n6 [Accessed: 02 April 2019]

[18] Siebert F, Peterson S, Schramm W. Four Theories of the Press. Urbana: university of Illinois Press; 1956

**55**

2019]

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?…*

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

Weaknesses that Needs to be Addressed. Paper presented at the Integrity and Corruption in the Media—How the Leadership Guiding Principles for African Media Owners and Managers (LGP) Promote Professionalism. Johannesburg, South Africa; 2014

[19] McQuail D. Four Theories of the Press. Urbana: University of Illinois

[20] Lister G. Media as Watchdog of Society Pointing towards the

[21] More information about the Freedom House available from: https://freedomhouse.org/ [Accessed:

[22] More information about the Transparency International available from: https://www.transparency.org/

[23] International Telecommunication Union (ITU). 2017. Statistics. Available from: https://www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/ Statistics/Pages/stat/default.aspx [Accessed: 20 January 2019]

[24] MORRA CAPITAL LIMITED. GCC Oil & Gas Report. 2012. Available from: http://www.morracapital.com/blog\_ files/O&G.pdf [Accessed: 15 February

[25] Freedom House Report: Kuwait.

2016. Available from: https:// freedomhouse.org [Accessed:

20 January 2019]

[Accessed: 20 January 2019]

Press; 1994. p. 124

20 January 2019]

*Press Freedom and Corruption in the GCC: Are There Better Future Horizons?… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86603*

[19] McQuail D. Four Theories of the Press. Urbana: University of Illinois Press; 1994. p. 124

[20] Lister G. Media as Watchdog of Society Pointing towards the Weaknesses that Needs to be Addressed. Paper presented at the Integrity and Corruption in the Media—How the Leadership Guiding Principles for African Media Owners and Managers (LGP) Promote Professionalism. Johannesburg, South Africa; 2014

[21] More information about the Freedom House available from: https://freedomhouse.org/ [Accessed: 20 January 2019]

[22] More information about the Transparency International available from: https://www.transparency.org/ [Accessed: 20 January 2019]

[23] International Telecommunication Union (ITU). 2017. Statistics. Available from: https://www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/ Statistics/Pages/stat/default.aspx [Accessed: 20 January 2019]

[24] MORRA CAPITAL LIMITED. GCC Oil & Gas Report. 2012. Available from: http://www.morracapital.com/blog\_ files/O&G.pdf [Accessed: 15 February 2019]

[25] Freedom House Report: Kuwait. 2016. Available from: https:// freedomhouse.org [Accessed: 20 January 2019]

**54**

2019]

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

[10] World Bank. Corruption. 2005. Available from: http://siteresources. worldbank.org/EXTABOUTUS/ Resources/Corruption.pdf [Accessed:

[11] Begovic B. Corruption: Concepts, types, causes and consequences. 2005. Available at: https://www.researchgate. net/publication/265364211 [Accessed:

[12] Starke C, Naab TK, Scherer H. Free to expose corruption: The impact of media freedom, internet access, and governmental online service delivery on corruption. International Journal of Communication. 2016;**10**:4702-4722

[13] Mothasedi N, Phiri A. The effects of mass media on corruption in South Africa: A MTAR-TEC Perspective. 2015. Available from: http://mpra.ub.unimuenchen.de/64338/ MPRA Paper No. 64338/PDF [Accessed: 10 January

[14] GCC Primary Law. 1981. Available from: http://www.gcc-sg.org [Accessed:

[15] Worldometers. World Population. 2018. Available from: http://www. worldometers.info/world-population/ population-by-country/ [Accessed:

[16] McQuail D. Mass Communication Theory. Third ed. London: Sage Publications Ltd; 1994. p. 124

[17] A Free and Responsible Press Details. pp. 20-29

[Accessed: 02 April 2019]

Available at: https://archive.org/ afreeandresponsiblepressdetails/ in.ernet.dli.2015.211705/page/n6

[18] Siebert F, Peterson S, Schramm W. Four Theories of the Press. Urbana: university of Illinois Press; 1956

15 February 2019]

15 February 2019]

2019]

20 January 2019]

10 February 2019]

**References**

20 January 2019]

1985. p. 247

p. 128

[1] United Nations Human Rights Declaration, Article 19. Available from: http://www.un.org/en/ [Accessed:

[2] Kayali A. Politics Encyclopedia (Seven Volume). Vol. 2nd. Beirut: Arab Institution for Studies and Publishing;

[3] Danesi M. Dictionary of Media and Communications. New York, London, England: M.E. Sharpe Armonk; 2009.

[4] UNESCO World Press Freedom. Available from: http://www.unesco.org

Communication in the Twenty-First Century. London: Longman Pub Group;

[6] UNESCO. World Trends in Freedom of Expression and Media Development 2017/2018. Global Report-Executive Summary; 2017. Available from: http:// ar.unesco.org/world-media-trend [Accessed: 15 February 2019]

[7] Ronning H. Freedom of expression

[8] Brioschi C. Corruption: A Short History. Washington: The Brookings Institution; 2017. Available from: https://www.brookings.edu/.pdf [Accessed: 10 January 2019]

[9] Tanzi V. Corruption around the World: Causes, Consequences, Scopes, and Cures. International Monetary Fund (IMF); 1998. Available from: https://www.IMF.org/External/Pubs/ FT/WP/PDF [Accessed: 20 January

is not a given right. Nordicom Information. 2013;**3-4**(35):3-13. Available from: http://www.nordicom. gu.se/.pdf [Accessed: 10 January 2019]

[Accessed: 20 January 2019]

[5] Stevenson RL. Global

1994. pp. 120-121

**57**

**Chapter 3**

**Abstract**

of journalism as well.

Panama Papers

**1. Introduction**

countries ([1], p. 153).

for private gain" [2]. It includes [3]:

Arab World

*Abdulrahman Al-Shami*

Unveiling of Matters: The Role

of Investigative Journalism in

Uncovering Corruption in the

This study investigates types of corruption that had been revealed by investigative reports during the last 3 years and their impact on social, legislative, and other aspects of life. It surveys 145 reports achieved and published by Arab investigative journalists from Egypt, Yemen, Tunisia, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Bahrain, Palestine, Mauritania, Algeria, Kuwait, and Sudan. Investigative reports address serious issues of corruption ranging from bottom level of the society up to top level of the authority. Yet it is the strongest journalistic tools for revealing and combating corruption. The Panama Papers reports reveal cross-border corruption and offshore companies for top-tier politicians and powerful people. The study concludes that the top four dominant corruption issues include administrative and financial issues, legislative and judiciary issues, abuse of power and political influence, and medical issues. The study also explores difficulties that are facing investigative journalism in the Arab world and the future of this type

**Keywords:** corruption, Arab world, investigative journalism, story-based inquiry,

Corruption is a complex phenomenon and a difficult problem in all around the world. It is complex because of its deep roots in the social, cultural, economic, political, legal, and ethical value systems of individuals, communities, cultures, and

A: Dishonest or illegal behavior especially by powerful people B: Inducement to wrong by improper or unlawful means

ratio and multiplies agony and suffering of Arab people.

Transparency International defines corruption as "the abuse of entrusted power

It is not exaggeration to say that corruption in the Arab world is the common factor that stands behind major problems faced by its countries. It increases poverty

Corruption in the Arab world seems to be a chronical and progressive disease that turns to epidemic in some Arab countries. This is due to the lack of democratic system that allows for equal citizenship, equal opportunities, social justice, human

#### **Chapter 3**

## Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab World

*Abdulrahman Al-Shami*

#### **Abstract**

This study investigates types of corruption that had been revealed by investigative reports during the last 3 years and their impact on social, legislative, and other aspects of life. It surveys 145 reports achieved and published by Arab investigative journalists from Egypt, Yemen, Tunisia, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Bahrain, Palestine, Mauritania, Algeria, Kuwait, and Sudan. Investigative reports address serious issues of corruption ranging from bottom level of the society up to top level of the authority. Yet it is the strongest journalistic tools for revealing and combating corruption. The Panama Papers reports reveal cross-border corruption and offshore companies for top-tier politicians and powerful people. The study concludes that the top four dominant corruption issues include administrative and financial issues, legislative and judiciary issues, abuse of power and political influence, and medical issues. The study also explores difficulties that are facing investigative journalism in the Arab world and the future of this type of journalism as well.

**Keywords:** corruption, Arab world, investigative journalism, story-based inquiry, Panama Papers

#### **1. Introduction**

Corruption is a complex phenomenon and a difficult problem in all around the world. It is complex because of its deep roots in the social, cultural, economic, political, legal, and ethical value systems of individuals, communities, cultures, and countries ([1], p. 153).

Transparency International defines corruption as "the abuse of entrusted power for private gain" [2]. It includes [3]:

A: Dishonest or illegal behavior especially by powerful people

B: Inducement to wrong by improper or unlawful means

It is not exaggeration to say that corruption in the Arab world is the common factor that stands behind major problems faced by its countries. It increases poverty ratio and multiplies agony and suffering of Arab people.

Corruption in the Arab world seems to be a chronical and progressive disease that turns to epidemic in some Arab countries. This is due to the lack of democratic system that allows for equal citizenship, equal opportunities, social justice, human

right, dignity, transparency, and accountability. Despite the political changes that shook the Arab region on 2011, corruption has not witnessed any improvement. On the contrary, the majority of Arab countries have failed to fulfill the will of the people to build democratic systems allowing for greater transparency and accountability [4].

According to the Corruption Perceptions Index 2016, 90% of the Arab countries have scored below 50, which is a failing grade. Five out of the 10 most corrupt countries in the world are from the following regions: Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, and Syria [4]. Those countries are also inflicted with political instability, war, internal conflicts, and terrorism, stressing the fact that war and conflict fuel corruption and in particular political corruption [4]. Moreover, they in specific have occupied these ranks throughout the year 2012–2016, followed by Algeria, Egypt, Mauritania, and Lebanon ranking from 108 to 136. Only the United Arab Emirates and Qatar which occupy 24 and 31 ranks, respectively, other Arab countries fall within 70–90 ranks in this index [5].

The failure to fight corruption explains the sharp drop of most of the Arab countries in the Corruption Perceptions Index 2016. The hope for Arab countries to fight corruption and end impunity has not seen any progress yet [5].

#### **2. Investigative journalism and corruption in the Arab world**

Investigative journalism (IJ) is a form of journalism in which reporters go indepth to investigate a single story that may uncover corruption, review government policies or of corporate houses, or draw attention to social, economic, political, or cultural trends ([6], p. 7) as well as loopholes in legislation and legal articles. It involves exposing to the public matters that are concealed—either deliberately by someone in a position of power or accidentally—behind a chaotic mass of facts and circumstances that obscure understanding ([7], p. 8).

Investigative journalism is a new phenomenon in the Arab world. During the last two decades, an important shift has occurred in this type of journalism in the Arab world led, mainly, by efforts of Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism (ARIJ).1 These reports had covered different aspects and tackled serious issues ranging from political, social, health, legislative, administrative, financial, educational, environmental, and other issues. These efforts have created new culture of story-based inquiry journalism in many Arab countries, like Egypt, Yemen, Tunisia, Jordan, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, and other countries. Many investigative reports had been achieved including written, audio, and video reports. However, majority of these reports were produced for print and online journalism.

Journalism in general and investigative reporting in specific play a vital role in raising awareness about corruption and combating it. They are among the most important sources of public awareness raising on corruption. However, investigative journalism is very challenging. Of thousands of journalists around the globe, only a few of them select this profession and decide to be investigative journalists.

**59**

its "sensitivity"!

impact.

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab…*

The Panama Papers represents one of the milestone successes of IJ to reveal some corruption of prominent figures in the Arab world including heads of states. A group of Arab journalists has been working secretly in Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Algeria, and Yemen as part of a global network of investigative reporters mining the so-called Panama Papers [8]. The investigation lasted a year and shows how influential people—including 12 heads of state—have used shell companies to avoid tax, launder money, and dodge sanctions. Those people implicated through family or associate's involvement in offshore accounts include former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, Bashar al-Assad, and Libya's late leader Muammar Gaddafi [9].

As mentioned earlier, IJ is a new phenomenon in the Arab world. During the last decades, Arabic newspapers are full of conventional reporting but not investigative reporting, which is different in the whole process. Type of research, source relations, and outcomes are completely different in both types of conventional reporting and IJ. Hunter lists 14 differences ([6], pp. 8–10) between conventional reporting and investigative journalism. Those differences relate to the process of research, source relations, and outcomes. Unlike the conventional reporting, information in IJ cannot be published until it is completed, research is continued, and documentation is required. Relations with sources are not good in most of the time, official information are hidden from the reporter who may challenge the official version, and sources are often cannot be identified for the sake of their security. Regarding outcomes, investigative journalist refuses to accept the world as it is, and the dramatic structure of the story is essential to its

Indeed a decisive alteration in IJ starts with the foundation of ARIJ in 2005. With grants from international donors, ARIJ has been able to provide professional and financial supports as well as legal support. This implies that IJ has not embedded in the Arab journalism yet. Unfortunately, ARIJ supports for journalists have been affected in the recent years due to shortage of financial support from the international donors. More cut of such support will affect IJ in the Arab world in the short

International donors' support plays a crucial role in terms of enabling investigative journalism in developing countries to operate. Oyedele et al.'s study has confirmed that foreign media assistance has an impact on independent media's workings and journalists' performance in Nigeria. The study has shown that media organizations and journalists can only improve on their reportage of critical

A serious challenge is related to freedom of expression in the Arab world, which has been declining in the recent years. A good piece of investigative report, like Death in Military Service, which took 2 years of journalistic work could not be broadcasted in Egypt. Television channels and newspapers that used to publish or broadcast this type of reporting had refused to broadcast it due to

The other dire challenge facing IJ in the Arab world relates to the increased challenges that print journalism as a professional is facing today. Majority of IJ achieved by Arab investigative journalists are in print format, which eliminate their

national sociopolitical issues when there is support from donors [10].

exposures and accordingly their impact on popular and official levels.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

**4. Challenges and future of IJ in the Arab world**

run and may jeopardize it in the long run.

**3. Panama Papers**

<sup>1</sup> Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism (ARIJ) is the first and leading media organization in the region dedicated to promoting investigative journalism in Arab newsrooms, which is still a new practice. It was formed in early 2005 to support independent quality professional journalism, through funding in-depth journalism projects and offering training and media coaching. ARIJ helps journalists working in print, radio, TV, and online media in Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Iraq, Bahrain, Palestine, Yemen, and Tunisia. For more information, visit https://en.arij.net/site-message.

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

#### **3. Panama Papers**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

right, dignity, transparency, and accountability. Despite the political changes that shook the Arab region on 2011, corruption has not witnessed any improvement. On the contrary, the majority of Arab countries have failed to fulfill the will of the people to build democratic systems allowing for greater transparency and account-

According to the Corruption Perceptions Index 2016, 90% of the Arab countries have scored below 50, which is a failing grade. Five out of the 10 most corrupt countries in the world are from the following regions: Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Yemen, and Syria [4]. Those countries are also inflicted with political instability, war, internal conflicts, and terrorism, stressing the fact that war and conflict fuel corruption and in particular political corruption [4]. Moreover, they in specific have occupied these ranks throughout the year 2012–2016, followed by Algeria, Egypt, Mauritania, and Lebanon ranking from 108 to 136. Only the United Arab Emirates and Qatar which occupy 24 and 31 ranks, respectively, other Arab countries fall within 70–90 ranks

The failure to fight corruption explains the sharp drop of most of the Arab countries in the Corruption Perceptions Index 2016. The hope for Arab countries to

Investigative journalism (IJ) is a form of journalism in which reporters go indepth to investigate a single story that may uncover corruption, review government policies or of corporate houses, or draw attention to social, economic, political, or cultural trends ([6], p. 7) as well as loopholes in legislation and legal articles. It involves exposing to the public matters that are concealed—either deliberately by someone in a position of power or accidentally—behind a chaotic mass of facts and

Investigative journalism is a new phenomenon in the Arab world. During the last two decades, an important shift has occurred in this type of journalism in the Arab world led, mainly, by efforts of Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism (ARIJ).1 These reports had covered different aspects and tackled serious issues ranging from political, social, health, legislative, administrative, financial, educational, environmental, and other issues. These efforts have created new culture of story-based inquiry journalism in many Arab countries, like Egypt, Yemen, Tunisia, Jordan, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, and other countries. Many investigative reports had been achieved including written, audio, and video reports. However, majority of

Journalism in general and investigative reporting in specific play a vital role in raising awareness about corruption and combating it. They are among the most important sources of public awareness raising on corruption. However, investigative journalism is very challenging. Of thousands of journalists around the globe, only a few of them select this profession and decide to be investigative

<sup>1</sup> Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism (ARIJ) is the first and leading media organization in the region dedicated to promoting investigative journalism in Arab newsrooms, which is still a new practice. It was formed in early 2005 to support independent quality professional journalism, through funding in-depth journalism projects and offering training and media coaching. ARIJ helps journalists working in print, radio, TV, and online media in Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Iraq, Bahrain, Palestine, Yemen, and

fight corruption and end impunity has not seen any progress yet [5].

**2. Investigative journalism and corruption in the Arab world**

circumstances that obscure understanding ([7], p. 8).

these reports were produced for print and online journalism.

Tunisia. For more information, visit https://en.arij.net/site-message.

**58**

journalists.

ability [4].

in this index [5].

The Panama Papers represents one of the milestone successes of IJ to reveal some corruption of prominent figures in the Arab world including heads of states. A group of Arab journalists has been working secretly in Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Algeria, and Yemen as part of a global network of investigative reporters mining the so-called Panama Papers [8]. The investigation lasted a year and shows how influential people—including 12 heads of state—have used shell companies to avoid tax, launder money, and dodge sanctions. Those people implicated through family or associate's involvement in offshore accounts include former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, Bashar al-Assad, and Libya's late leader Muammar Gaddafi [9].

#### **4. Challenges and future of IJ in the Arab world**

As mentioned earlier, IJ is a new phenomenon in the Arab world. During the last decades, Arabic newspapers are full of conventional reporting but not investigative reporting, which is different in the whole process. Type of research, source relations, and outcomes are completely different in both types of conventional reporting and IJ. Hunter lists 14 differences ([6], pp. 8–10) between conventional reporting and investigative journalism. Those differences relate to the process of research, source relations, and outcomes. Unlike the conventional reporting, information in IJ cannot be published until it is completed, research is continued, and documentation is required. Relations with sources are not good in most of the time, official information are hidden from the reporter who may challenge the official version, and sources are often cannot be identified for the sake of their security. Regarding outcomes, investigative journalist refuses to accept the world as it is, and the dramatic structure of the story is essential to its impact.

Indeed a decisive alteration in IJ starts with the foundation of ARIJ in 2005. With grants from international donors, ARIJ has been able to provide professional and financial supports as well as legal support. This implies that IJ has not embedded in the Arab journalism yet. Unfortunately, ARIJ supports for journalists have been affected in the recent years due to shortage of financial support from the international donors. More cut of such support will affect IJ in the Arab world in the short run and may jeopardize it in the long run.

International donors' support plays a crucial role in terms of enabling investigative journalism in developing countries to operate. Oyedele et al.'s study has confirmed that foreign media assistance has an impact on independent media's workings and journalists' performance in Nigeria. The study has shown that media organizations and journalists can only improve on their reportage of critical national sociopolitical issues when there is support from donors [10].

A serious challenge is related to freedom of expression in the Arab world, which has been declining in the recent years. A good piece of investigative report, like Death in Military Service, which took 2 years of journalistic work could not be broadcasted in Egypt. Television channels and newspapers that used to publish or broadcast this type of reporting had refused to broadcast it due to its "sensitivity"!

The other dire challenge facing IJ in the Arab world relates to the increased challenges that print journalism as a professional is facing today. Majority of IJ achieved by Arab investigative journalists are in print format, which eliminate their exposures and accordingly their impact on popular and official levels.

#### **5. What is story-based inquiry?**

Story-based inquiry is the story that begins by formulating the story the reporter hopes to write as a hypothesis that will be verified or disproved ([6], p. 2). Hypothesis is the fundamental and spirit of the story-based inquiry. This method helps reporters to identify the dimensions of their stories that they want to investigate and reveal their secret. However, developing a preliminary hypothesis for a story is not a fantasy or "guessing at the unknown." It is rather developed based on reporter's profound knowledge on the issue that result from deep and serious research.

Once hypothesis is developed, the next step is to analyze the hypothesis. By analyzing a hypothetical story, reporter can identify dimensions of the story and its boundaries. Hypothesis gives reporters something to verify and increase their chances of discovering secrets. It makes investigative project easier to manage and guarantees that reporter will deliver a story, not just a mass of data. Furthermore, hypothesis enables closer insight into whether the story meets legal and ethical criteria ([6], pp. 8, 16).

#### **6. Literature review**

Investigative journalism has gained a good attention from researchers. However, Arabic studies in this field are still lagging behind. This could be explained by the recency of investigative journalism practice as profession as well as lack of professional investigative journalists. Previous related studies explored this journalism from different approaches including its role in combating corruption, obstacles, and challenges investigative reporters are facing as well as from ethics perspective.

Pollack and Allern investigated the work of and methods used by investigative journalists in revealing large-scale corruption related to the expansion of Nordic telecom companies in Uzbekistan. They found that investigative journalists have played a crucial role in the disclosure of corruption, sometimes cooperating across media organizations and countries, demonstrating the importance of journalism as a public good for democracy [11].

Suntai and Shem [12] concluded in their study on tackling institutional corruption through investigative journalism that this type of journalism has the potency of combating corrupt practices in Nigeria. According to authors, it could mitigate and eliminate corrupt practices in the Nigerian society [12].

Investigative journalism is a difficult profession, and, therefore, it faces many obstacles in many times, many countries, and almost everywhere. Rabei's study [13] of Egyptian investigative journalism is the first of its kind. It investigated the current situation of the practice of investigative journalism in the Egyptian press, problems faced by investigative journalists, as well as the future of this journalism. Findings confirmed the negative effects of the press law in Egypt on investigative journalism. The laws have not only restricted the practice of investigative journalists' work but have not provided protection for them as well. As for the future of the investigative journalism, professional and academic elites stressed that the current political situation in Egypt relays on one strong political hegemony that will not encourage free flow of information, and, hence, it does not support investigative journalism [13]. These results are in line with the study's findings of Arabic Network for Media Support (2016) in which investigative journalists identified absence of law regulates the freedom of information circulation and lack of resources represent the major obstacle of investigative journalism in Egypt ([14], p. 6).

**61**

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab…*

Abu-Hassan investigated attitudes of Palestinian journalists toward the practice of investigative journalism. Findings revealed that the most important obstacles facing investigative journalists were self-fear of difficulty to complete investigative reports and fear of security prosecution or to be prosecuted by the influential people. Administrative obstacles included sources in the public institutions fear to speak freely as well as lack of financial resources. The absence of laws, which protect journalists from prosecution, was one of the most important legal obstacles that have hindered journalists from effectively practicing investigative journalism in

On the contrary, Lanosga and Houston explored the future of investigative reporting through a survey of 861 investigative journalists in the United States. Accordingly to findings, respondents reported high perception of autonomy and job satisfaction and confirmed resources for investigative reporting are maintaining

Gerli et al. investigated constraints and limitations faced by investigative journalism through the analysis of selected case studies of corruptive phenomena in Italy, Hungary, Romania, and Latvia. They found that this type of journalism does not work actually in the observed countries. According to findings, investigative journalism requires certain socioeconomic conditions, such as a low degree of influence of the political and economic spheres and a high level of journalistic professionalism, which are not always present in the aforementioned countries. Authors identified three factors that may affect investigative journalists' works: a certain proximity of publishers and politicians, advertising pressure, and the interferences

Singh assessed the general state of investigative journalism in seven Pacific Island countries and found that this journalism suffers from harsher legislation, beatings, and harassment of journalists as well as false charges and lawsuits that

Yusha'u 2009 identified the obstacles that are faced by investigative journalism in Nigeria which impede uncovering of corruption. According to results, clientelism is a feature of journalism practice and one of the factors that impedes the practice of investigative journalism. Other impediments include poor remuneration, bad working conditions, corruption within the media, and the relationship between

From ethical perspective, Fahkana investigated Palestinian journalists' attitudes toward investigative journalism ethics in Palestine and the extent to which the journalists are committed to the investigative journalism ethics. The study concluded that journalists should maintain the confidentiality of the investigation-related information sources. Reliance on secret sound recording and video tapping is justified only if work circumstances and the difficulty in gathering information require such act. The journalists highly approved that the investigative journalists might disguise to access information and to attain the required

Yet, the current study aims to add to this literature from Arabic perspective. Using content analysis of recent and 2-year-long reports provides evidence-based

The main objective of this study is to identify how IJ combats corruption in the

results on the role played by IJ in combating corrupting in the Arab world.

Arab world. Research questions for this study are as follows:

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

Palestine [15].

and even increasing [16].

of secret services [17].

target them in these countries [18].

publishers and politicians [19].

**7. Scope and methodology**

objective [20].

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

Abu-Hassan investigated attitudes of Palestinian journalists toward the practice of investigative journalism. Findings revealed that the most important obstacles facing investigative journalists were self-fear of difficulty to complete investigative reports and fear of security prosecution or to be prosecuted by the influential people. Administrative obstacles included sources in the public institutions fear to speak freely as well as lack of financial resources. The absence of laws, which protect journalists from prosecution, was one of the most important legal obstacles that have hindered journalists from effectively practicing investigative journalism in Palestine [15].

On the contrary, Lanosga and Houston explored the future of investigative reporting through a survey of 861 investigative journalists in the United States. Accordingly to findings, respondents reported high perception of autonomy and job satisfaction and confirmed resources for investigative reporting are maintaining and even increasing [16].

Gerli et al. investigated constraints and limitations faced by investigative journalism through the analysis of selected case studies of corruptive phenomena in Italy, Hungary, Romania, and Latvia. They found that this type of journalism does not work actually in the observed countries. According to findings, investigative journalism requires certain socioeconomic conditions, such as a low degree of influence of the political and economic spheres and a high level of journalistic professionalism, which are not always present in the aforementioned countries. Authors identified three factors that may affect investigative journalists' works: a certain proximity of publishers and politicians, advertising pressure, and the interferences of secret services [17].

Singh assessed the general state of investigative journalism in seven Pacific Island countries and found that this journalism suffers from harsher legislation, beatings, and harassment of journalists as well as false charges and lawsuits that target them in these countries [18].

Yusha'u 2009 identified the obstacles that are faced by investigative journalism in Nigeria which impede uncovering of corruption. According to results, clientelism is a feature of journalism practice and one of the factors that impedes the practice of investigative journalism. Other impediments include poor remuneration, bad working conditions, corruption within the media, and the relationship between publishers and politicians [19].

From ethical perspective, Fahkana investigated Palestinian journalists' attitudes toward investigative journalism ethics in Palestine and the extent to which the journalists are committed to the investigative journalism ethics. The study concluded that journalists should maintain the confidentiality of the investigation-related information sources. Reliance on secret sound recording and video tapping is justified only if work circumstances and the difficulty in gathering information require such act. The journalists highly approved that the investigative journalists might disguise to access information and to attain the required objective [20].

Yet, the current study aims to add to this literature from Arabic perspective. Using content analysis of recent and 2-year-long reports provides evidence-based results on the role played by IJ in combating corrupting in the Arab world.

#### **7. Scope and methodology**

The main objective of this study is to identify how IJ combats corruption in the Arab world. Research questions for this study are as follows:

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

knowledge on the issue that result from deep and serious research.

Story-based inquiry is the story that begins by formulating the story the reporter hopes to write as a hypothesis that will be verified or disproved ([6], p. 2). Hypothesis is the fundamental and spirit of the story-based inquiry. This method helps reporters to identify the dimensions of their stories that they want to investigate and reveal their secret. However, developing a preliminary hypothesis for a story is not a fantasy or "guessing at the unknown." It is rather developed based on reporter's profound

Once hypothesis is developed, the next step is to analyze the hypothesis. By analyzing a hypothetical story, reporter can identify dimensions of the story and its boundaries. Hypothesis gives reporters something to verify and increase their chances of discovering secrets. It makes investigative project easier to manage and guarantees that reporter will deliver a story, not just a mass of data. Furthermore, hypothesis enables closer insight into whether the story meets legal and ethical

Investigative journalism has gained a good attention from researchers. However, Arabic studies in this field are still lagging behind. This could be explained by the recency of investigative journalism practice as profession as well as lack of professional investigative journalists. Previous related studies explored this journalism from different approaches including its role in combating corruption, obstacles, and challenges investigative reporters are facing as well as from

Pollack and Allern investigated the work of and methods used by investigative journalists in revealing large-scale corruption related to the expansion of Nordic telecom companies in Uzbekistan. They found that investigative journalists have played a crucial role in the disclosure of corruption, sometimes cooperating across media organizations and countries, demonstrating the importance of journalism as

Suntai and Shem [12] concluded in their study on tackling institutional corruption through investigative journalism that this type of journalism has the potency of combating corrupt practices in Nigeria. According to authors, it could mitigate and

Investigative journalism is a difficult profession, and, therefore, it faces many obstacles in many times, many countries, and almost everywhere. Rabei's study [13] of Egyptian investigative journalism is the first of its kind. It investigated the current situation of the practice of investigative journalism in the Egyptian press, problems faced by investigative journalists, as well as the future of this journalism. Findings confirmed the negative effects of the press law in Egypt on investigative journalism. The laws have not only restricted the practice of investigative journalists' work but have not provided protection for them as well. As for the future of the investigative journalism, professional and academic elites stressed that the current political situation in Egypt relays on one strong political hegemony that will not encourage free flow of information, and, hence, it does not support investigative journalism [13]. These results are in line with the study's findings of Arabic Network for Media Support (2016) in which investigative journalists identified absence of law regulates the freedom of information circulation and lack of resources represent

**5. What is story-based inquiry?**

criteria ([6], pp. 8, 16).

**6. Literature review**

ethics perspective.

a public good for democracy [11].

eliminate corrupt practices in the Nigerian society [12].

the major obstacle of investigative journalism in Egypt ([14], p. 6).

**60**


ARIJ website was selected for this study. The study's population constitutes all archived and retrieved investigative reports from 2010 to 2018. A comprehensive sample of the population was selected for this study. It covers all reports published from 2016 to 2018. One hundred fourth-five reports were retrieved on September 2018 from ARIJ website using Google search engine. The author believes this is a sufficient sample to provide us with, at least, indications on how IJ contributes to combating corruption. The selected period of the sample provides the most recent corruption issues tackled by investigative reports, particularly the Panama Papers, which represents cross-border corruption. Bearing in mind, investigative reports need months to be achieved and sometimes a year or more, like "*Moot fi alkema"* or Death in Military Service, which according to BBC website lasted for 2 years [21].

Selecting ARIJ for implementing the study refers to the role it plays in this genre of journalism. It is a nongovernmental and prominent association when it comes to IJ works in the Arab world. ARIJ is the only specialized and dedicated association in IJ including training. Almost all active investigative reporters in the Arab world are affiliate to this association and had been trained by them.

The study uses content analysis to answer research questions. Content categories along with code sheet were used guided by the operational definitions of issues. The content categories are comprised of the following corruption issues: administrative and financial, legislative and judiciary, abuse of power and political influence, medical, environmental and agricultural, and educational.

### **8. Operational definitions**


**63**

**Table 1.**

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab…*

• Educational corruption is "the systematic use of public office for private benefit, whose impact is significant on the availability and quality of educational goods and services, and, has impact on access, quality or equity

**Table 1** includes different types of corruption that investigative reports tackled during the period from 2016 to 2018. The top four dominant issues of the six corruption issues include administrative and financial, legislative and judiciary, abuse of power and political influence, and medical issues. These issues occupy 89.6% of

Bear in mind that corruption issues are overlapping and intertwined at many times particularly when it comes to abuse of power and political influence that stand behind many financial corruption issues in Arab countries. Another example of the overlapping is procuring prohibited drug from pharmacies without a proper drug prescription which is a medical violation. However, absence of control, weak of monitoring and conflict between official regulatory and supervisory bodies contribute to this practice. Such overlapping applies to many cases of issues of corruption these reports investigated. Yet the author classified issues to major fault and

According to the data in **Table 2**, Egyptian investigative journalists achieved the highest number of investigative reports tackling corruption in Egypt with 31% of total ratio of investigative reports followed by Yemeni journalists with 17.9%. Tunisian investigative journalists occupied the third rank with 8.3%, followed by investigative journalists from Syria, Lebanon, and Jordan in the same rank. Joint works by a group of Arab journalists came in the sixth rank with 5.5%. Minor marriage in Egypt, Yemen and Lebanon is an example of this type of joint works. The Panama Papers, which will come next, is the prominent achievement of this work. Reports on corruption issues in Iraq and Bahrain occupied seventh place with 4.8% for each. Palestinian investigative journalists came in the eight rank with 4.1%. Other Arab countries including Algeria, Kuwait, Sudan, and

**No. Type of corruption No. Percent** 1. Administrative and financial 44 30.3 2. Legislative and judiciary 41 28.3 3. Abuse of power and political influence 26 17.9 4. Medical 19 13.1 5. Environmental and agricultural 10 6.9 6. Educational 5 3.4 Total 145 100

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in the Arab world from 2016 to 2018.*

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

**9.1 Corruption issues in the investigative reports**

shortage that allow corruption practices to occur.

**9.2 Type of corruption based on Arab countries**

Mauritania occupy lowest position.

the total issues of corruptions that investigative reports addressed.

in education" [25].

**9. Finding**

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

• Educational corruption is "the systematic use of public office for private benefit, whose impact is significant on the availability and quality of educational goods and services, and, has impact on access, quality or equity in education" [25].

#### **9. Finding**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

• What type of corruption investigative reports tackled during the study period?

• Which Arab countries' investigative reports tackled during the study period?

• How investigative reports tackled corruption in the Arab countries during the

ARIJ website was selected for this study. The study's population constitutes all archived and retrieved investigative reports from 2010 to 2018. A comprehensive sample of the population was selected for this study. It covers all reports published from 2016 to 2018. One hundred fourth-five reports were retrieved on September 2018 from ARIJ website using Google search engine. The author believes this is a sufficient sample to provide us with, at least, indications on how IJ contributes to combating corruption. The selected period of the sample provides the most recent corruption issues tackled by investigative reports, particularly the Panama Papers, which represents cross-border corruption. Bearing in mind, investigative reports need months to be achieved and sometimes a year or more, like "*Moot fi alkema"* or Death in Military Service, which according to

Selecting ARIJ for implementing the study refers to the role it plays in this genre of journalism. It is a nongovernmental and prominent association when it comes to IJ works in the Arab world. ARIJ is the only specialized and dedicated association in IJ including training. Almost all active investigative reporters in the Arab world are

The study uses content analysis to answer research questions. Content categories along with code sheet were used guided by the operational definitions of issues. The content categories are comprised of the following corruption issues: administrative and financial, legislative and judiciary, abuse of power and political influence,

• Administrative and financial issues within this study can refer to any administrative act of breaching the rules and regulations designed for private gain [22]. It includes all types of governmental and private officials' violations or failure to activate and implement indorsed rules and regulations. Examples of such issue are as follows: fraud, bribery, smuggling, money laundering, exploitation labor, negligence of performing duties, waste of public money, absence of control, lack of safety procedures, and other issues related to administration and financial.

• Abuse of power and political influence refers to improper use of authority by someone who has that authority because he or she holds a public office [23].

• Medical corruption includes all types of illegal and/or unethical practice and medical errors committed intentionally or unintentionally by doctors or medi-

• Environmental corruption is defined as problems with the planet's systems (air, water, soil, etc.) that have developed because of human interference or

• Is there a place for IJ in the Arab world?

study period?

BBC website lasted for 2 years [21].

**8. Operational definitions**

affiliate to this association and had been trained by them.

medical, environmental and agricultural, and educational.

cal practitioners causing damage to other people.

mistreatment of the planet [24].

**62**

#### **9.1 Corruption issues in the investigative reports**

**Table 1** includes different types of corruption that investigative reports tackled during the period from 2016 to 2018. The top four dominant issues of the six corruption issues include administrative and financial, legislative and judiciary, abuse of power and political influence, and medical issues. These issues occupy 89.6% of the total issues of corruptions that investigative reports addressed.

Bear in mind that corruption issues are overlapping and intertwined at many times particularly when it comes to abuse of power and political influence that stand behind many financial corruption issues in Arab countries. Another example of the overlapping is procuring prohibited drug from pharmacies without a proper drug prescription which is a medical violation. However, absence of control, weak of monitoring and conflict between official regulatory and supervisory bodies contribute to this practice. Such overlapping applies to many cases of issues of corruption these reports investigated. Yet the author classified issues to major fault and shortage that allow corruption practices to occur.

#### **9.2 Type of corruption based on Arab countries**

According to the data in **Table 2**, Egyptian investigative journalists achieved the highest number of investigative reports tackling corruption in Egypt with 31% of total ratio of investigative reports followed by Yemeni journalists with 17.9%. Tunisian investigative journalists occupied the third rank with 8.3%, followed by investigative journalists from Syria, Lebanon, and Jordan in the same rank. Joint works by a group of Arab journalists came in the sixth rank with 5.5%. Minor marriage in Egypt, Yemen and Lebanon is an example of this type of joint works. The Panama Papers, which will come next, is the prominent achievement of this work. Reports on corruption issues in Iraq and Bahrain occupied seventh place with 4.8% for each. Palestinian investigative journalists came in the eight rank with 4.1%. Other Arab countries including Algeria, Kuwait, Sudan, and Mauritania occupy lowest position.


**Table 1.**

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in the Arab world from 2016 to 2018.*


#### *Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

**Table 2.**

**65**

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab…*

According to investigative reports, corruption issues in the Arab countries were

• In Egypt, administrative and financial issues occupy the first rank, followed by legislative and judiciary issues, medical issues, environmental issues, and

• For Yemen, legislative and judiciary issues occupy the first rank, followed by medical issues, abuse of power and political influence issues, and

• In Tunisia, legislative and judiciary issues come in the first rank, followed

• In Lebanon, abuse of power and political influence occupy the first rank,

• For Jordan, legislative and judiciary issues came in the first rank, followed by abuse of power and political influence and then administrative and

Legislative and judiciary issues are common among Yemen, Tunisia, Lebanon, and Jordan, while abuse of power and political influence issues are very common

**Tables 3**–**13** (Appendix) include different types of corruption issues based on

• Administrative and financial corruption: tax evasion, money laundering, and smuggling of weapons, drugs, and diesel. Commercial fraud and absence of control led to, for instance, recycling used tires in Egypt, selling relief materials in Yemen, as well as selling expired gas cylinders and spread of unlicensed gas stations. Construction fraud, wasting public fund, and selling professional titles "Judge" in Egypt in return for attending training workshops. Secret immigration to Europe due to loopholes in Egyptian and Greek airports and Egyptian government failure to manage loan from the World Bank deprived seven villages from sanitation. Neglecting victims and injuries of revolution in Egypt and Tunisia, forged residency permits in Egypt, and some child care centers in Egypt mistreated and expelled children to the street, exacerbating homelessness. Some Egyptian preachers exploit mosques to hatch ISIS children, granting pension fund's apartments to eligible persons in Tunisia, as well as telecommunication towers randomly spread regardless of safety measures. Journalists in Iraq killed, for instance, by ISIS sniper, due to lack of safety measures. Marginalized communities' negligence, victims of crossroads of railways, lack of safety measure in transportation railway in Tunisia, as well as facilitating movement of citizens with disabilities is not being fully implemented.

Arab countries. The following are some examples of these corruptions:

• Abuse of power and political influence occupy the first rank for Iraq,

• While for Syria, abuse of power and political influence occupy the first rank, followed by administrative and financial issues and then medical issues.

by administrative and financial issues and then medical issues.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

administrative and financial issues.

followed by legislative and judiciary issues.

followed by administrative and financial issues.

**9.3 Corruption issues based on Arab countries**

ranked as follows:

educational issues.

financial issues.

among Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq.

*Investigative reports on corruption issues based on Arab countries from 2016 to 2018.*

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

According to investigative reports, corruption issues in the Arab countries were ranked as follows:


Legislative and judiciary issues are common among Yemen, Tunisia, Lebanon, and Jordan, while abuse of power and political influence issues are very common among Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq.

#### **9.3 Corruption issues based on Arab countries**

**Tables 3**–**13** (Appendix) include different types of corruption issues based on Arab countries. The following are some examples of these corruptions:

• Administrative and financial corruption: tax evasion, money laundering, and smuggling of weapons, drugs, and diesel. Commercial fraud and absence of control led to, for instance, recycling used tires in Egypt, selling relief materials in Yemen, as well as selling expired gas cylinders and spread of unlicensed gas stations. Construction fraud, wasting public fund, and selling professional titles "Judge" in Egypt in return for attending training workshops. Secret immigration to Europe due to loopholes in Egyptian and Greek airports and Egyptian government failure to manage loan from the World Bank deprived seven villages from sanitation. Neglecting victims and injuries of revolution in Egypt and Tunisia, forged residency permits in Egypt, and some child care centers in Egypt mistreated and expelled children to the street, exacerbating homelessness. Some Egyptian preachers exploit mosques to hatch ISIS children, granting pension fund's apartments to eligible persons in Tunisia, as well as telecommunication towers randomly spread regardless of safety measures. Journalists in Iraq killed, for instance, by ISIS sniper, due to lack of safety measures. Marginalized communities' negligence, victims of crossroads of railways, lack of safety measure in transportation railway in Tunisia, as well as facilitating movement of citizens with disabilities is not being fully implemented.

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

41

**64**

**No.**

1.

Administrative and

16

4

3

2

1

2

7

3

2

2

2

44

financial

2. 3.

Abuse of power and

2

6

0

5

4

2

political influence

4. 5.

Environmental and

6

1

1

agricultural

6. Total Percent

Rank

**Table 2.**

Educational

4 45 31

1 *Investigative reports on corruption issues based on Arab countries from 2016 to 2018.*

2

3

4

5

5

6

7

7

8

9

—

17.9

8.3

7.6

6.2

6.2

5.5

4.8

4.8

4.1

3.4

100

26

12

11

9

9

8

7

7

6

5

145

1

Medical

6

6

2

2

Legislative and judiciary

11

9

6

1

4

5

1

1 3

1 2

1 2

19

10

5

1

2

26

2

1

**Type of corruption**

**Egypt**

**Yemen**

**Tunisia**

**Syria**

**Lebanon**

**Jordan**

**More** 

**Iraq**

**Bahrain**

**Palestine**

**Other** 

**countries**

**than one** 

**country**

**Countries**

**Total**


**67**

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab…*

emitted from some factories in Alexandria and noise and air pollution in Tunis and Egypt. Hazardous wastes and dust loaded with poisonous gases due to interaction with chemical residues that led to death of some people in Egypt.

• Educational corruption: depriving children from right of education, plagiarism in illiteracy tests, failure to integrate children with disability into regular education system, and unlicensed educational centers in Egypt manipulating students and learners by giving them fake certificates attributed to international universities.

Apart from international investigation led by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and based on the Panama Papers, a group of Arab

investigative journalists from Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria, Syria, Iraq, and Yemen have achieved and published eight investigative reports on 2017 revealing what *The Guardian* [27] called "offshore secret of politicians." They were able to track activities and deals of 71 Arabic companies in the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Tunis, and Yemen that have financial and commercial with what is known as "Russian Laundromat." The share of the Arab companies and banks is estimated to be at half a billion dollars of money laundering operations for 20 billion and 800 million dollar worldwide [28]. Corruption issues revealed by those investigative reports and based on the

• Ayad Allawi, former Iraqi Prime Minster, ownership of three hidden and tax

• Yemen telecom company Mobile Telephone Network is predominantly owned by five offshore companies—most of them owned by Yemeni businessman

• Five companies registered in the UAE free zones within the file of the Russian

• Nine Arab companies are involved in the laundering of 10 million dollars in the

laundry. Iran used one of these companies to evade sanctions.

• Laundering 25 million dollars through fake projects and bills.

• Thirteen UAE companies involve in the largest file for the laundering of

• Offshore companies for the wife of Chakib Khelil, former Energy Minister in

• Revealing hidden assets for tax havens through offshore holdings for one of Yemen's prominent businessmen Mohammad Fahem, known as Yemen's Wheat

• UAE-based enterprises involved in Russian laundry.

• How the Algerian elite diverted oil money.

• The Panama Papers exposes Yemen's Wheat Emperor.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

**9.4 Panama Papers**

Panama Papers include:

Shaher Abdualhak.

Russian laundry.

Russian money.

Algeria.

Emperor.

haven real estate companies.

emitted from some factories in Alexandria and noise and air pollution in Tunis and Egypt. Hazardous wastes and dust loaded with poisonous gases due to interaction with chemical residues that led to death of some people in Egypt.

• Educational corruption: depriving children from right of education, plagiarism in illiteracy tests, failure to integrate children with disability into regular education system, and unlicensed educational centers in Egypt manipulating students and learners by giving them fake certificates attributed to international universities.

#### **9.4 Panama Papers**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

hazards and death Syrian refugees faced in the African Sahara.

evidence of systematic attempts to cover up these violations.

• Medical corruption issues: some doctors remove the wombs of mentally

• Environmental corruption: vehicles' emissions and cutting down trees in Palestine including oak trees and long-standing trees. Coal dust and cement

disabled girls with the consent of parents, human trade organ, Yemeni doctors infected with cholera virus due to lack of immunity measures. Renting lab licenses—a popular market in Egypt and the patient pays the price. Merchants of the war, Yemen's cancer and kidney patients suffering due to lack of medication, sick leave market, illegal abortion, medical errors that lead to disabilities, mental health hospitals in Bahrain have become drug stores, and some medical companies in Egypt in cooperation with international companies conduct illegal clinical excremental. Unlicensed children's incubators, business production of artificial limbs in the workshops in stairwells, unlicensed clinics in Yemen,

• Abuse of power and political influence: The so-called "Swiss Leaks" revealed that the wife of former Egyptian Minister of Tourism had two secret accounts in HSBC Private Bank Suisse SA holding a total of \$3,870,357 between 2006 and 2007 and escaped the Egyptian authorities' decision to freeze her accounts after the revolution of January 2011. Offshore companies, safe tax havens, food import monopoly, money launderers, and tax exemption. Abuse of power in military has documented that soldiers in the Egyptian Central Security Forces have been abused and possibly killed by their officers. Reportage found

• Legislative and judiciary: torture in Tunisia; slavery still exists in Yemen; minor marriage in Egypt, Yemen, and Lebanon; exchange marriage in Yemen; Syria's fatherless children; ISIS children; children without pedigree; depriving females from inheritance; no financial and moral compensation provisions for time falsely spent in jail; and pretrial detention for punishing political opponents. Public prosecution could renew this kind of detention as many times as he wishes. An investigative report conducted in Egypt documented a case of such punishment in which a young man had been prisoned for 14 months before releasing him and drubbing the case due to insufficient evidences. An Egyptian court in Cairo has renewed the detention of Al Jazeera journalist, Mahmoud Hussein, for the 17th time. Until December 12, 2018, he has been in prison in Egypt for more than 661 days despite not being charged [26]. Weak law enforcement of child custody judgments doubles the suffering of divorced mothers due to depriving them from custody of their children. Egyptian government violates constitution by allowing using coal in industry. Children sexual abuse, child molestation, rape of children and its psychological damage, as well as children execution under 16 years of age. An investigative report documented children excursion in Saudi Arabia and Yemen for committed crimes when they were less than 16 years old despite the two countries signed the Treaty of Child Rights. According to the reports, more than 222 children are facing murder cases in 12 Yemeni governorates. "Seasonal workers" are labor outside of law protection, exploitation of domestic workers including sex trade, marital rape, placing detainees in tiny spaces "inch and something", recruiting children and failure to enforce the law deprives persons with special needs of their rights. Current Jordanian electoral system does not achieve justice between the kingdom's departments, unlicensed slaughterhouses, and tax havens violating international law in Yemen. An investigative report conducted in Egypt tracks the

**66**

and human organ trafficking.

Apart from international investigation led by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and based on the Panama Papers, a group of Arab investigative journalists from Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria, Syria, Iraq, and Yemen have achieved and published eight investigative reports on 2017 revealing what *The Guardian* [27] called "offshore secret of politicians." They were able to track activities and deals of 71 Arabic companies in the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Tunis, and Yemen that have financial and commercial with what is known as "Russian Laundromat." The share of the Arab companies and banks is estimated to be at half a billion dollars of money laundering operations for 20 billion and 800 million dollar worldwide [28].

Corruption issues revealed by those investigative reports and based on the Panama Papers include:


#### **10. Discussion**

The number of investigative reports achieved and published during the period of the study confirms that there is a place for IJ in the Arab world despite of the tremendous obstacles and difficulties facing this kind of reporting as well as reporters in those countries. For instance, significant number of Egyptian media organizations used to welcome IJ before 2013. Several reports will be published and broadcasted in both print and broadcast media like *Al-Masry Al-Youm*, *Al-Shorouk*, *ALYoum7*, *Al Watan*, *Alsabah*, and ONTV and others (Arabic Network for Media Support 14). In 2010, five investigative journalism units had been established in Jordan, Palestine, and Egypt. Between 2o12 and 2013, 13 units had been established in other Arab countries [29]. Moreover, IJ in the Arab world increasingly gets attention from international media and donors.

The role of the media is critical in promoting good governance and controlling corruption. It not only raises public awareness about corruption, its causes, consequences, and possible remedies but also investigates and reports incidences of corruption. Often, reports on corrupt practices by government officials have provided the starting point for a series of consequences such as the launch of investigation or judicial proceedings and resignation, among others. Together with these visible effects, media reporting has also had equally important indirect effects thanks to the role it plays in society ([30], pp. 1–20).

Finding of the study of investigative reports confirms that administrative and financial issues as well as legislative and judiciary issues represent the most prominent corruption that are faced by Arab countries throughout the last decades. Both of them occupied 58% of corruption issues that investigative reports had revealed between 2016 and 2018. Abuse of power and political influence also play an important role in this aspect. According to these reports, more than 17% of corruption were attributed to corrupt politicians and businesspersons having financial relations with those politicians in most cases. Politicians usually provide their business partners with several supports. This include, but are not limited to, political cover of tax evasions and monopoly of import and export of particularly essential goods, as in the case of wheat in Yemen, and natural resources such as oil in Algeria.

Legal system represents one of the pressing issues that need to be reconsidered for any reforming process in the Arab world. For instance, many Arab countries are still lagging behind when it comes to legalizing age of marriage. Therefore, minor marriage is a very common practice in those countries. Legalizing age of marriage at 18 years old will save life of many young girls and prevent a lot of suffering. Remand detention represents one of the flagrant misuses of law for revenge from opponents. Judicial authority may renew prisoner detention as many times as desired! Rule of law, social justice, equal citizenship, and human right are essential for modern and civil state, and these are basic principles that journalism and modern actors should struggle to achieve.

Investigative journalism represents an important opportunity for combating deep-rooted corruption in the Arab world. It is a journalism of verification, deep and long-time research, as well as evidence-based journalism. In highly corrupt

**69**

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab…*

countries, it is advised that journalists change their approaches and be consistent in their pursuit of values, attitudes, and fight against corruption by developing and

Therefore, investment in this type of journalism is worthy and rewarding. This could be through providing financial support especially for those working in the poorest countries, building and developing capacities, as well as providing legal advice, consultancy, and protection for the Arab investigative journalists. This has become extremely important in the current circumstances in which journalism is suffering due to the Internet and technology development. Unfortunately, the audience has keen interest in investigative report findings but is unwilling to pay for its scoops or exposés ([32], p. 1). Freedom of expressions is very crucial for IJ to grow and flourish. The effectiveness of the media, in turn, depends on access to information and freedom of expression, as well as a professional and ethical framework of investigative journalists ([30], p. 1). In Egypt, investigative reports were doubled seven times in 2011 comparing to 2010 and to 50% in 2014. Moreover, they won many local and regional awards. This could be explained by relative freedom of speech and information circulation after the January

Schools and colleges of journalism need to pay more attention to identify and prepare investigative journalists for tomorrow. These reporters are very rare in the world, let alone the Arab world. Approximately, in every 1000 journalists, there is

Finally, combating corruption in the Arab world needs serious efforts and profound reform in the political system. This reform will not occur without having

**No. Report headline Type of corruption Date of publication**

2. It Hasn't Inferred Legislative and judiciary May 9, 2018 3. The Lost Gold Agricultural March 8, 2018

6. "Under Experiment" Medical April 18, 2018

8. New Cars from Old Parts Administrative January 19, 2018

11. Waste Mines Environmental January 9, 2017 12. "Integration on the Papers" Educational August 27, 2017

Legislative and judiciary April 10, 2018

Legislative and judiciary July 15, 2018

Legislative and judiciary June 19, 2018

Educational May 2, 2018

Legislative and judiciary December 26, 2017

Administrative December 19, 2017

Administrative May 8, 2017

25 , 2011 Revolution that led to political regime change ([14], p. 25).

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

only one investigative journalist!

**A. Appendix**

political will and popular determination.

1. Child Brides in Egypt—Loopholes and Cleric Endorsements

4. Detained for Good: The Use of Remand Detention as a Punitive Measure Against

5. Services Offices: Rear Door for Sex Trade and Exploitation of Domestic Workers

7. In Alko'arah Egyptian Village… Children

9. Children Who Have Been Raped Face Society with Psychological Damage

10. With Documents: Wasting One Billion and 300 Million Sacks in "Kema Aswan 2"

13. Loopholes in Egyptian and Greek Airports Allow Secret Immigration to Europe

Political Opponents

Dream of School

promoting investigative journalism ([31], p. 34).

#### *Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

countries, it is advised that journalists change their approaches and be consistent in their pursuit of values, attitudes, and fight against corruption by developing and promoting investigative journalism ([31], p. 34).

Therefore, investment in this type of journalism is worthy and rewarding. This could be through providing financial support especially for those working in the poorest countries, building and developing capacities, as well as providing legal advice, consultancy, and protection for the Arab investigative journalists. This has become extremely important in the current circumstances in which journalism is suffering due to the Internet and technology development. Unfortunately, the audience has keen interest in investigative report findings but is unwilling to pay for its scoops or exposés ([32], p. 1).

Freedom of expressions is very crucial for IJ to grow and flourish. The effectiveness of the media, in turn, depends on access to information and freedom of expression, as well as a professional and ethical framework of investigative journalists ([30], p. 1). In Egypt, investigative reports were doubled seven times in 2011 comparing to 2010 and to 50% in 2014. Moreover, they won many local and regional awards. This could be explained by relative freedom of speech and information circulation after the January 25 , 2011 Revolution that led to political regime change ([14], p. 25).

Schools and colleges of journalism need to pay more attention to identify and prepare investigative journalists for tomorrow. These reporters are very rare in the world, let alone the Arab world. Approximately, in every 1000 journalists, there is only one investigative journalist!

Finally, combating corruption in the Arab world needs serious efforts and profound reform in the political system. This reform will not occur without having political will and popular determination.


### **A. Appendix**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

tax havens and offshore fronts to dodge taxes in Yemen.

former Deputy Prime Minister of Yemen.

tion from international media and donors.

the role it plays in society ([30], pp. 1–20).

**10. Discussion**

• Uncover offshore company owned by Abdul-Hafez Al-Alimi, the son of the

• Murder, tax evasion, cronyism: Yemen's Sugar Kings implicated in the Panama Papers revealing how hidden companies controlled by most prominent businessmen in Yemen, the brothers Abdulhak, Shaher, and Abduljalil, have used

The number of investigative reports achieved and published during the period of the study confirms that there is a place for IJ in the Arab world despite of the tremendous obstacles and difficulties facing this kind of reporting as well as reporters in those countries. For instance, significant number of Egyptian media organizations used to welcome IJ before 2013. Several reports will be published and broadcasted in both print and broadcast media like *Al-Masry Al-Youm*, *Al-Shorouk*, *ALYoum7*, *Al Watan*, *Alsabah*, and ONTV and others (Arabic Network for Media Support 14). In 2010, five investigative journalism units had been established in Jordan, Palestine, and Egypt. Between 2o12 and 2013, 13 units had been established in other Arab countries [29]. Moreover, IJ in the Arab world increasingly gets atten-

The role of the media is critical in promoting good governance and controlling corruption. It not only raises public awareness about corruption, its causes, consequences, and possible remedies but also investigates and reports incidences of corruption. Often, reports on corrupt practices by government officials have provided the starting point for a series of consequences such as the launch of investigation or judicial proceedings and resignation, among others. Together with these visible effects, media reporting has also had equally important indirect effects thanks to

Finding of the study of investigative reports confirms that administrative and financial issues as well as legislative and judiciary issues represent the most prominent corruption that are faced by Arab countries throughout the last decades. Both of them occupied 58% of corruption issues that investigative reports had revealed between 2016 and 2018. Abuse of power and political influence also play an important role in this aspect. According to these reports, more than 17% of corruption were attributed to corrupt politicians and businesspersons having financial relations with those politicians in most cases. Politicians usually provide their business partners with several supports. This include, but are not limited to, political cover of tax evasions and monopoly of import and export of particularly essential goods, as in the case of wheat in Yemen, and natural resources such as oil in Algeria.

Legal system represents one of the pressing issues that need to be reconsidered for any reforming process in the Arab world. For instance, many Arab countries are still lagging behind when it comes to legalizing age of marriage. Therefore, minor marriage is a very common practice in those countries. Legalizing age of marriage at 18 years old will save life of many young girls and prevent a lot of suffering. Remand detention represents one of the flagrant misuses of law for revenge from opponents. Judicial authority may renew prisoner detention as many times as desired! Rule of law, social justice, equal citizenship, and human right are essential for modern and civil state, and these are basic principles that journalism and modern actors should struggle to achieve. Investigative journalism represents an important opportunity for combating deep-rooted corruption in the Arab world. It is a journalism of verification, deep and long-time research, as well as evidence-based journalism. In highly corrupt

**68**


**71**

**Table 4.**

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab…*

**No. Report headline Type of corruption Date of publication** 43. Forged Residency Permits Administrative January 26, 2016 44. A Decorated Fraud Administrative August 1, 2016

**No. Report headline Type of corruption Date of publication** 1. Gas Cylinders…Time bombs in Yemeni Houses Administrative July 10, 2018 2. War Cholera Medical August 16, 2018 3. Rituals in the Darkness Legislative and judiciary July 26, 2018

5. Merchants of the War Medical July 5, 2018

8. "I Have No Right in The Inheritance of My Father" Legislative and judiciary April 3, 2018 9. Forgotten Students Educational January 19, 2018 10. "Sons of the War " Legislative and judiciary December 13, 2017

12. Death in the Clothes of Angels!! Medical November 21, 2017

14. "Black Relief" Legislative and Judiciary August 9, 2017

16. Pharmaceutical Drug Abuse Medical November 14, 2016

19. Begging for Survival Medical October 17, 2016 20. Yemen's Toxic Qat Administrative July 10, 2016

22. Yemen's Cancer Patients: the Fight for Medication Medical September 8, 2016

25. Sana'a Child Beggar Mafias Legislative and judiciary January 28, 2016

17. Backdoor Companies of Hameed Al Ahmar Abuse of power and

18. Panama Papers Expose Yemen's Wheat Emperor Abuse of power and

23. Hidden Money of Abdul Haq Family in Yemen Abuse of power and

Financial July 22, 2018

Legislative and judiciary March 27, 2018

Administrative October 12, 2017

Legislative and judiciary October 29, 2017

Legislative and judiciary March 2, 2017

March 20, 2018

November 13, 2016

July 11, 2016

October 9, 2016

April 6, 2016

April 13, 2016

Abuse of power and political influence

political influence

political influence

Abuse of power and political influence

political influence

Abuse of power and political influence

Cyberbullying No date

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Egypt.*

4. Shaher Abdulhak's Tax Havens Violate

to Escape his Crime in London

6. Exchange Marriage in Yemen: A Time Bomb for

7. Son of one of the Wealthiest Arabs lives in Sanaa

11. Repeated Fires at Unlicensed Gas Stations Claim

13. Children under the Guillotine... Execution by Sword and Bullets Shut Teams

15. Slavery is Still Exists In Yemen: Segregation Between Masters and Slaves

21. The Mysterious Company of a Former Minister's

24. Murder, Tax Evasion, Cronyism: Yemen's Sugar Kings Implicated in Panama Papers

26. Digital Platforms Trap—Parties of the Conflict in Yemen Kill the Champions of the Media

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Yemen.*

International Law

Hundreds of Families

Yemeni Lives

Son

**Table 3.**

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*


#### **Table 3.**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

14. Black Exhale-Coal Dust and Cement Harm Egyptian People Chests

Thousand Egyptians out of Coverage

19. Networks of Preachers Exploit Mosques and Associations to Hatching ISIS

20. Noise is a Bitter Reality Inhabitants of "Amir Algousih" Street Suffer

27. Renting Labs Licenses... A Popular Market and Patient Pays the Price

31. "Individual Employees" Labor Outside The

34. Upside Down, The Victims and Injuries of the Revolution in Egypt and Tunisia from the Bright Promises to the Corners of

35. (Official waste) ... Government Failure To Manage World Bank Loan Deprives 7

36. Swiss Leaks Expose Egyptian Mastermind Behind Massive Corruption Deal

37. Business Production of Artificial Limbs in Workshops under Stairwell

38. "The Stolen Innocent".. Doctors Remove

39. When Child Care Homes... Feed In

Parents Consent

"Homeless"

the Wombs of Mentally Disabled Girls with

Villages from Sanitation

Protection of the Law

Forgetfulness

17. In the Island of "Sidna Al-Wali," 5

"Dawaish Children"

**No. Report headline Type of corruption Date of publication**

15. Incomplete Dreams in "Abu Saed" Environmental November 7, 2017 16. Fraud Accreditation Educational October 7, 2017

18. A False Womb Medical March 5, 2017

21. "Kornit Trip" Administrative February 2, 2017 22. Legalized Marital Rape Legislative and judiciary January 29, 2017 23. Siwa Oasis… Drowning Threatening Environmental May 1, 2017 24. Compensation Rather than Law Legislative and judiciary December 29, 2016

26. A Fatal Mistake Medical April 12, 2016

28. Towards illiteracy Educational November 26, 2016 29. Egypt's Ticking Time Bombs in Gas Bottles Legislative and judiciary July 11, 2016 30. Lost Parentage Legislative and judiciary May 11, 2016

32. Frozen Hopes and Harsh Laws Legislative and judiciary October 10, 2016 33. Eastern Gate Refugee hazard September 25, 2016

40. Death in Military Service Military May 2, 2016 41. Death by Remote Control Administrative January 28, 2016 42. Titles for Sale Administrative January 27, 2016

25. A Housewife with Big Swiss Bank Accounts Abuse of power and

Environmental May 8, 2017

Administrative March 7, 2017

Administrative March 4, 2017

Environmental March 3, 2017

Medical February 12, 2016

Legislative and judiciary October 23, 2016

Administrative August 18, 2016

Administrative December 8, 2016

Financially July 23, 2016

Medical July 17, 2016

Medical March 7, 016

Administrative November 5, 2016

December 20, 2016

political influence

**70**

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Egypt.*


#### **Table 4.**

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Yemen.*

#### *Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*


#### **Table 5.**

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Tunisia.*


**73**

**Table 9.**

**Table 8.**

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab…*

**No. Report headline Type of corruption Date of publication**

2. Compromised Innocence Legislative and judiciary September 21, 2016 3. Teachers of Contracts of Acquiescence Legislative and judiciary April 9, 2016

7. An Engineer's Latest Rip Off Administrative August 3, 2016

**No. Report headline Type of corruption Date of** 

2. Gaza (Disneyland) Administrative December 31,

3. Black Emissions Environment November 29,

4. The Season of Trees Execution Environment August 29, 2016

6. Diluting Diesel Administrative January 27, 2016

Administrative July 16, 2017

Legislative and judiciary August 21, 2016

Legislative and judiciary January 19, 2016

September 8, 2016

**publication**

December 3, 2017

2016

2016

Medical February 7, 2016

May 21, 2016

Abuse of power and political

Abuse of power and political

Abuse of power and political influence

influence

influence

**No. Report headline Type of corruption Date of publication** 1. ISIS Children Legislative and judiciary December 8, 2017

3. Looking for a Suicidal Job in Iraq? Administrative December 21, 2016 4. "Project No One" Financial November 18, 2017

influence

influence

influence

7. ISIS's Young Yazidi is Recruiting Abuse of power and political

Abuse of power and political

Abuse of power and political

Administrative January 26, 2017

December 17, 2017

May 11, 2016

May 11, 2016

2. The Vengeance of Suspended Projects Worsens ... and Kills!

5. Caravan: a Deal at the Expense of Life of the Displaced People

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Iraq.*

6. Panama Papers Reveal Allawi's Hidden Companies

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

1. Government Negligence Delays Activating Alimony Fund for Seven Years

4. Defective Innocence: Who Compensates the Accused for Arrest after Being Acquitted?

6. Jordanian Figures Hiding Behind the Shadow

8. The Current Electoral System in Jordan Does Not Achieve Justice Between the Kingdom's

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Jordan.*

1. Abbas to the Influential: "With Approval…No Objection on the Exemption"

5. Medicines of "the Ministry of Health" Are Sold in Pharmacies, Hundreds of Psychiatric Patients and

Their Families are at Risk of Dying

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Palestine.*

5. Tenders of Millions Value Go to Former Parliamentarians Pockets

of Tax Havens

Departments

**Table 7.**

#### **Table 6.**

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Syria.*

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*


#### **Table 7.**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

4. Air Pollution in Tunisia Legislative and

6. Punishing the Disabled Legislative and

10. Tunisia's Unpunished Child Molestation Legislative and

11. Torture in Tunisia Legislative and

3. "Death Trucks": Women's Way to The Cultivated Land and Sometimes to the Grave or Permanent Disability

5. Injustice Justification …. Granting Pension Fund's Apartments to Ineligible Persons.

7. Foreign Companies Dominate the Seeds Market in

9. (Towers of Horror) ... Communication Towers in Tunisia Randomly Spread Out

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Tunisia.*

2. Assad's Relatives Seize the Territory of the Roman

5. Panama Papers: Who is Running Assad's Sanctions-

7. Panama Papers Link Assad's Fixer to Arms Dealers

8. Men Around The President 2: Maruf and Alzayat... "Breaks" The Lion And The Arms Dealer

Army and Rent it to NATO

busting Network?

and Money Launderers

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Syria.*

Tunisia

**Table 5.**

**No. Report headline Type of corruption Date of** 

1. "Killing in the Womb" Medical October 29, 2017 2. Sick leave Market Medical January 9, 2017

8. The Next Death on the "Railroad" Administrative November 20,

**No. Report headline Type of corruption Date of** 

1. Second Wife Administrative October 4,

3. Deadly Scalpel Medical May 1, 2018 4. Syria's Fatherless Children Legislative and judiciary October 9,

9. Pirates of the Mediterranean Administrative March 3, 2016 10. Body Parts for Sale Medical January 27,

6. Men Around the President 1: Abdulkareem Network Abuse of power and

Legislative and judiciary

judiciary

judiciary

judiciary

judiciary

Abuse of power and political influence

Abuse of power and political influence

political influence

Abuse of power and political influence

Abuse of power and political influence

**publication**

November 2, 2017

April 12, 2016

2016

2016

2016

July 10, 2016

March 17, 2016

**publication**

March 21, 2018

2018

2016

April 6, 2016

April 5, 2016

April 14, 2016

April 13, 2016

2016

Administrative December 20,

Agriculture November 22,

Administrative October 25, 2016

December 21, 2016

**72**

**Table 6.**

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Jordan.*


#### **Table 8.**

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Palestine.*


#### **Table 9.**

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Iraq.*

#### *Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*


#### **Table 10.**

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Lebanon.*


#### **Table 11.**

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Bahrain.*


**75**

**Author details**

Doha, Qatar

Abdulrahman Al-Shami

provided the original work is properly cited.

\*Address all correspondence to: aalshami@qu.edu.qa

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,

Mass Communication Department, College of Arts and Sciences, Qatar University,

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab…*

2. UAE Companies Involve in Russian Laundry Financial December 19, 2017

4. UAE-Based Enterprises Involved in Russian Laundry Financial December 6, 2017

7. Fraud in Export of Sheep from Georgia to Arab Countries Administrative September 1, 2017

**corruption**

Financial No date

Financial November 30, 2017

Financial December 6, 2017

Financial January 23, 2017

Legislative No date

**Date of publication**

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

**No. Report headline Type of** 

1. Five Companies Registered in the UAE Free Zones among the File of the Russian Laundry... Contradictory Bills and Iran Used One of These Companies to Evade Sanctions

3. UAE Companies in The "Sink"... the Involvement of 13 Companies in the Largest File for the Laundering of

5. Whitening 25 Million Dollars Through Fake Projects

6. Nine Arab Companies are Involved in The Laundering of 10 Million Dollars in The Russian Laundry

8. I Do Not Want to Live With Him—I Have to Live With My

*Investigative reports on more than one Arab country corruption issues.*

and Bills.. 10 Arab Companies Outside The Coverage Of

Russian Money

Telephone or Postal

Family

**Table 13.**

#### **Table 12.**

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in other Arab countries.*

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*


#### **Table 13.**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

2. "State for Rent" Abuse of power and

1. Mosac Fonseca To the Brother in Law of the Speaker of the Lebanese Parliament: Where Do You Get This?

3. "Crimes of the Occasion": Hidden Episodes of

4. Minors' Marriage in Lebanon: Between the Rule of Sects and the Inability of the State

5. "The Voice of the Earth... Southern lands are Public

7. Failure to Enforce the Law Deprives Persons With Special Needs from Their Rights

8. Video: Lebanon Documents of Panama—a

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Lebanon.*

Violence in Lebanon

Complete Episodes

Domain"

**No. Report headline Type of corruption Date of publication**

Abuse of power and political influence

political influence

Abuse of power and political influence

Abuse of power and political influence

Legislative and judiciary March 18, 2018

Legislative and judiciary December 13, 2017

Legislative and judiciary December 5, 2016

June 21, 2018

April 17, 2018

October 29, 2017

May 4, 2016

October 15, 2018

June 18, 2016

May 15, 2016

November 7, 2017

Educational November 2, 2017

**No. Report headline Type of corruption Date of publication**

9. From Mouth of the Lion Financial February 28, 2016

6. "The Afflicted" Legislative and Judiciary November 25, 2016

5. Lost Ages and Wasted Rights Administrative June 21, 2016 6. The Scammer… a Friend of Bahrain Abuse of power and political influence November 5, 2016 7. Deceptive Virility Administrative April 1, 2016

**No. Country Report headline Type of corruption Date of publication**

judiciary

Abuse of power and political influence

Abuse of power and political influence

political influence

Legislative/environmental November 16, 2017

Legislative November 8, 2017

Medical September 22, 2016

Medical July 12, 2016

1. The Pressure of the Dust Suspended

2. Unlicensed Slaughterhouses…De Facto

4. Bahrain's Mental Health Hospitals Have

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in Bahrain.*

2. Algeria Panama Papers: Offshore Companies

3. Kuwait Cheated Education: Research Papers

*Investigative reports on corruption issues in other Arab countries.*

1. Mauritania Living Dead Legislative and

for the Wife of Chakib Khelil, Former Algerian Minister

for Sale at Kuwait University

Panama Papers: How the Algerian Elite Diverted Oil Money

4. Sudan In Sudan: "Living Between Feathers" Abuse of power and

3. A Scream of Unconscious Person... When the Hospital Turns into a

in the Air

**Table 10.**

Coexistence

Pharmacy

**Table 11.**

Become Drug Stores

**74**

**Table 12.**

*Investigative reports on more than one Arab country corruption issues.*

#### **Author details**

Abdulrahman Al-Shami

Mass Communication Department, College of Arts and Sciences, Qatar University, Doha, Qatar

\*Address all correspondence to: aalshami@qu.edu.qa

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

### **References**

[1] Chattopadhyay S. Corruption in healthcare and medicine-corruption in healthcare and medicine: Why should physicians and bioethicists care and what should they do? Journal of Medical Ethics. 2013;**10**(3):153-159. DOI: 10.20529/IJME.2013.049

[2] Transparency International. How Do You Define Corruption?. Available from: https://www.transparency.org/ what-is-corruption?gclid=Cj0KCQi Ai57gBRDqARIsABhDSMpwydoAJ jtAPozLwCQsiIGUDLIoKkyn5cfOcLgDq8cXyhwBNJeqL0aArTeEALw\_ wcB#define [Accessed: 15 October 2018]

[3] Merriam-Webster. Corruption. Available from: https://www.merriamwebster.com/dictionary/corruption [Accessed: 20 October 2018]

[4] Hattar K. Middle East and North Africa: A Very Drastic Decline. 2017. Available from: https://www. transparency.org/news/feature/ mena\_a\_very\_drastic\_decline [Accessed: 12 October 2018; 20 October 2018]

[5] Transparency International. Corruption Perceptions Index. 2016. Available from: https://www. transparency.org/news/feature/ corruption\_perceptions\_index\_2016? gclid=Cj0KCQjw3KzdBRDWARIsAIJ8 TMSpFqWEU5PdMc\_vA89qCs PVl7UIMZcOmnNpa4orW7iJbSAsufn3 NuwaAp5wEALw\_wcB [Accessed: 15 September 2018]

[6] Nazakat S, KAS Media Programme, editors. How to Become a Mouthpiece for the People, a Manual for Investigative Journalism. 2018. Available from: http://www. investigative-manual.org/wp-content/ uploads/2016/09/Investigative-Journalism-Manual.pdf [Accessed: 10 November 2018]

[7] Hunter M et al. Story-Based Inquiry: A Manual for Investigative Reporting. Paris: UNICCO Publishing; 2011

[8] Coronel S. Against the Odds, Investigative Journalism Persists in the Middle East Columbia Journalism Review. 2016. Available from: https://www.cjr.org/analysis/ arab\_investigative.php [Accessed: 15 November 2018]

[9] Albwaba. Arab Media Partners for Panama Papers. 2016. Available from: https://www.albawaba.com/loop/arabmedia-partners-panama-papers-825240 [Accessed: 05 September 2018]

[10] Oyedele J, Lasisi I, Kolawole A. Analysis of foreign aid-induced investigative journalism practice in Nigeria. Journal of Management and Social Science. 2018;**7**(2):435-454

[11] Pollack E, Allern S. Disclosure of Scandinavian telecom companies' corruption in Uzbekistan: The role of investigative journalists. European Journal of Communication. 2018: 33(1): 73-88. DOI: 10.1177/0267323117750697 [Accessed: 05 September 2018]

[12] Suntai DI, Shem W. Tackling institutional corruption through investigative journalism. Global Media Journal. 2018:16-30. Available from: https://bit.ly/2tMpwhu [Accessed: 05 September 2018]

[13] Rabei M. Investigative journalism as an emerging pattern in the Arab press: A study of reality and problems in addition to exploring attitudes of professional and academic elites about the future of this pattern in the Egyptian press [PhD dissertation]. Mass Communication Department, Almenia University, Egypt. 2013. Available from: https://bit.ly/2tLnCOb [Accessed: 05 September 2018]

**77**

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab…*

from: http://european-science.com/ eojnss\_proc/article/viewFile/3680/1402

[24] Your Dictionary. Available from: http://www.yourdictionary.com/ environmental-issues [Accessed:

[25] Hallak J, Poisson M. Ethics and Corruption in Education (Policy Forum No. 15). Results from the Expert Workshop held at the IIEP, Paris, France, 28-29 November 2001. Paris: IIEP-UNESCO. Available from:https://www.researchgate. net/profile/Muriel\_Poisson/ publication/44829662\_Ethics\_and\_ corruption\_in\_education\_results\_ from\_the\_experts\_workshop\_ held\_at\_the\_IIEP\_-\_Paris\_28-

links/56de068e08aeb8b66f94a4eb.pdf.

[Accessed: 20 November 2018]

com/news/2018/10/mahmoudhussein-sentence-renewed-17thtime-181012075336817.html [Accessed:

[26] Aljazeera. Mahmoud Hussein's Detention Renewed for the 17th Time. Available from: https://www.aljazeera.

[27] The Guardian. Paradise Papers Leak Reveals Secrets of the World Elite's Hidden Wealth. Available from: https:// www.theguardian.com/news/2017/ nov/05/paradise-papers-leak-revealssecrets-of-world-elites-hidden-wealth.

[28] Arab Reporters for Investigative Reporting. Panama Papers. Available from https://en.arij.net/?s=Panama.

[Accessed: 20 October 2018]

[Accessed: 01 October 2018]

[Accessed: 15 March 2019]

[23] Abuse of Power. West's Encyclopedia of American Law, edition 2. 2008. Available from: https:// legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary. com/Abuse+of+Power [Accessed:

25 November 2018]

15 September 2018]

29\_November\_2001/

25 October 2018]

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

[14] Arabic Network for Media Support. Egyptian investigative journalism— Successes and obstacles as seen by journalists. 2016. Available from: https://bit.ly/2UltYPR [Accessed:

05 September 2018]

[15] Abu-Hassan S. Attitudes of Palestinian journalists towards the practice of investigative journalism—A field study. Arabian Journal for Media and Communication. 2017;**1**(17):11-17

[16] Lanosga G, Houston B. Journalists assess investigative reporting and its status in society. Journalism Practice. 2017;**11**(9):1101-1120. DOI: 10.1080/17512786.2016.1228472. [Accessed: 20 December 2018]

[17] Gerli M, Mazzoni M, Mincigrucci R.

investigative journalism in Hungary, Italy, Latvia and Romania. European Journal of Communication. 2018;**33**(1):22-36

[18] Singh S. Investigative journalism: Challenges, perils, rewards in seven Pacific Island countries. Pacific Journalism Review. 2012;**18**(1):83-104

[19] Yusha'u M. Investigative journalism and scandal reporting in the Nigerian press. African Journalism Studies.

[20] Fahkanah M. Palestinian journalists'

journalism ethics: A field study [Master thesis]. Palastine: The Islamic University

[21] Huniti A. Death in Service or "Mut Fi Alkedma". BBC. Available from: http:// www.bbc.com/arabic/resources/idt-sh/ arabic\_death [Accessed: 20 October 2019]

attitudes towards investigative

[22] Mousavi P, Pourkiani M. Administrative corruption: Ways of tackling the problem. European Online Journal of Natural and Social Sciences. 2013;**2**(3):178-187. Available

2009;**30**(2):155-174

of Gaza; 2018

Constraints and limitations of

*Unveiling of Matters: The Role of Investigative Journalism in Uncovering Corruption in the Arab… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86418*

[14] Arabic Network for Media Support. Egyptian investigative journalism— Successes and obstacles as seen by journalists. 2016. Available from: https://bit.ly/2UltYPR [Accessed: 05 September 2018]

[15] Abu-Hassan S. Attitudes of Palestinian journalists towards the practice of investigative journalism—A field study. Arabian Journal for Media and Communication. 2017;**1**(17):11-17

[16] Lanosga G, Houston B. Journalists assess investigative reporting and its status in society. Journalism Practice. 2017;**11**(9):1101-1120. DOI: 10.1080/17512786.2016.1228472. [Accessed: 20 December 2018]

[17] Gerli M, Mazzoni M, Mincigrucci R. Constraints and limitations of investigative journalism in Hungary, Italy, Latvia and Romania. European Journal of Communication. 2018;**33**(1):22-36

[18] Singh S. Investigative journalism: Challenges, perils, rewards in seven Pacific Island countries. Pacific Journalism Review. 2012;**18**(1):83-104

[19] Yusha'u M. Investigative journalism and scandal reporting in the Nigerian press. African Journalism Studies. 2009;**30**(2):155-174

[20] Fahkanah M. Palestinian journalists' attitudes towards investigative journalism ethics: A field study [Master thesis]. Palastine: The Islamic University of Gaza; 2018

[21] Huniti A. Death in Service or "Mut Fi Alkedma". BBC. Available from: http:// www.bbc.com/arabic/resources/idt-sh/ arabic\_death [Accessed: 20 October 2019]

[22] Mousavi P, Pourkiani M. Administrative corruption: Ways of tackling the problem. European Online Journal of Natural and Social Sciences. 2013;**2**(3):178-187. Available from: http://european-science.com/ eojnss\_proc/article/viewFile/3680/1402 [Accessed: 15 March 2019]

[23] Abuse of Power. West's Encyclopedia of American Law, edition 2. 2008. Available from: https:// legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary. com/Abuse+of+Power [Accessed: 25 November 2018]

[24] Your Dictionary. Available from: http://www.yourdictionary.com/ environmental-issues [Accessed: 15 September 2018]

[25] Hallak J, Poisson M. Ethics and Corruption in Education (Policy Forum No. 15). Results from the Expert Workshop held at the IIEP, Paris, France, 28-29 November 2001. Paris: IIEP-UNESCO. Available from:https://www.researchgate. net/profile/Muriel\_Poisson/ publication/44829662\_Ethics\_and\_ corruption\_in\_education\_results\_ from\_the\_experts\_workshop\_ held\_at\_the\_IIEP\_-\_Paris\_28- 29\_November\_2001/ links/56de068e08aeb8b66f94a4eb.pdf. [Accessed: 20 November 2018]

[26] Aljazeera. Mahmoud Hussein's Detention Renewed for the 17th Time. Available from: https://www.aljazeera. com/news/2018/10/mahmoudhussein-sentence-renewed-17thtime-181012075336817.html [Accessed: 25 October 2018]

[27] The Guardian. Paradise Papers Leak Reveals Secrets of the World Elite's Hidden Wealth. Available from: https:// www.theguardian.com/news/2017/ nov/05/paradise-papers-leak-revealssecrets-of-world-elites-hidden-wealth. [Accessed: 20 October 2018]

[28] Arab Reporters for Investigative Reporting. Panama Papers. Available from https://en.arij.net/?s=Panama. [Accessed: 01 October 2018]

**76**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

[7] Hunter M et al. Story-Based Inquiry: A Manual for Investigative Reporting. Paris: UNICCO Publishing; 2011

[8] Coronel S. Against the Odds, Investigative Journalism Persists in the Middle East Columbia Journalism Review. 2016. Available from: https://www.cjr.org/analysis/ arab\_investigative.php [Accessed:

[9] Albwaba. Arab Media Partners for Panama Papers. 2016. Available from: https://www.albawaba.com/loop/arabmedia-partners-panama-papers-825240

[Accessed: 05 September 2018]

[10] Oyedele J, Lasisi I, Kolawole A. Analysis of foreign aid-induced investigative journalism practice in Nigeria. Journal of Management and Social Science. 2018;**7**(2):435-454

[11] Pollack E, Allern S. Disclosure of Scandinavian telecom companies' corruption in Uzbekistan: The role of investigative journalists. European Journal of Communication. 2018: 33(1): 73-88. DOI: 10.1177/0267323117750697

[Accessed: 05 September 2018]

05 September 2018]

05 September 2018]

[12] Suntai DI, Shem W. Tackling institutional corruption through investigative journalism. Global Media Journal. 2018:16-30. Available from: https://bit.ly/2tMpwhu [Accessed:

[13] Rabei M. Investigative journalism as an emerging pattern in the Arab press: A study of reality and problems in addition to exploring attitudes of professional and academic elites about the future of this pattern in the Egyptian press [PhD dissertation]. Mass Communication Department, Almenia University, Egypt. 2013. Available from: https://bit.ly/2tLnCOb [Accessed:

15 November 2018]

[1] Chattopadhyay S. Corruption in healthcare and medicine-corruption in healthcare and medicine: Why should physicians and bioethicists care and what should they do? Journal of Medical

Ethics. 2013;**10**(3):153-159. DOI:

[2] Transparency International. How Do You Define Corruption?. Available from: https://www.transparency.org/ what-is-corruption?gclid=Cj0KCQi Ai57gBRDqARIsABhDSMpwydoAJ jtAPozLwCQsiIGUDLIoKkyn5cfOcLgDq8cXyhwBNJeqL0aArTeEALw\_ wcB#define [Accessed: 15 October

[3] Merriam-Webster. Corruption. Available from: https://www.merriamwebster.com/dictionary/corruption

[4] Hattar K. Middle East and North Africa: A Very Drastic Decline. 2017. Available from: https://www. transparency.org/news/feature/

[5] Transparency International. Corruption Perceptions Index. 2016.

Available from: https://www. transparency.org/news/feature/ corruption\_perceptions\_index\_2016? gclid=Cj0KCQjw3KzdBRDWARIsAIJ8 TMSpFqWEU5PdMc\_vA89qCs

15 September 2018]

10 November 2018]

[6] Nazakat S, KAS Media

mena\_a\_very\_drastic\_decline [Accessed: 12 October 2018; 20 October 2018]

PVl7UIMZcOmnNpa4orW7iJbSAsufn3 NuwaAp5wEALw\_wcB [Accessed:

Programme, editors. How to Become a Mouthpiece for the People, a Manual for Investigative Journalism. 2018. Available from: http://www. investigative-manual.org/wp-content/ uploads/2016/09/Investigative-Journalism-Manual.pdf [Accessed:

[Accessed: 20 October 2018]

10.20529/IJME.2013.049

**References**

2018]

**Chapter 4**

**Abstract**

A Theory of Corruption and

This chapter was a theoretical construct on corruption within the context of long-run growth. It stressed and expounded the quality implications of corrupt practices for full capacity output. Rational behavior of economic agents was

assumed and the typical capitalist economy was the setting. The ultimate channel of the effect of corruption on long-run growth was a declining total factor productivity growth that in turn caused the full information natural rate level of output to fall below full capacity output. Both the investment and human capital transmission mechanisms of corruptive practices were focused with trappings of institutional corruption discernible in the two cases. Different permutations and likely results were indicated and analyzed. The overall conclusion was that corruption was unde-

**Keywords:** corruption, total factor productivity growth, long-run growth,

Most studies on corruption stressed its growth penalizing impact (see, e.g., [1–4]). Three channels of effect were common in the literature, viz. human capital, institutions, and investment (e.g., [5]). In the majority of cases, the short-run effect was emphasized. However, in a recent publication, [6] developed a theoretical model to underpin the passive understanding that corruption lowered the marginal product of capital, hence, the growth of the economy. The channel of effect emphasized in the study was a reduced return on investment via an arbitrary tax. By this, corruption adversely affected the productivity (and, thus, productivity growth) of private capital, thereby, implicitly, impacting long-run growth.<sup>1</sup>

In the present chapter, the long-run effect of corruption was emphasized. The investment channel was retained but the route differed: investment quality rather than tax effect was stressed. Additionally, the human capital or labor productivity channel was developed to show that a significant fall in total factor productivity growth would be the ultimate result of corrupt practices. In the two cases, trappings of institutional corruption were discernible. Different permutations and likely results were analyzed. In Section 2 of the chapter, the model was presented with a

<sup>1</sup> Ordinarily, productivity is a level concept but, under a "continuous context" assumption, it turns into a

Productivity Growth

sirable from the perspective of long-run growth.

environment and growth, public policy **JEL Codes:** A11, A13, A23, 044, Z18

**1. Introduction**

growth factor.

**79**

*Oluremi Davies Ogun*

[29] ARIJ Website. About ARIJ. Available from: https://arij.net/%D8%B9% D9%86-%D8%A7%D8%B1% D9%A%D8%AC/. [Accessed: 18 March 2019]

[30] Stapenhurst R. The Media's Role in Curbing Corruption. World Bank Institute. Washington, DC: International Bank for Reconstruction and Development; 2000

[31] Oyebode O. Weak-kneed media and festering corruption in Nigeria. Journal of International and Global Studies. 2017;**8**(2):34-49

[32] Gómez E, Sandoval-Martín M. Interest and willingness to pay for investigative reporting: A solution for the crisis of journalism? Communications Society. 2016;**29**(1):1-19

#### **Chapter 4**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

[29] ARIJ Website. About ARIJ. Available

D9%A%D8%AC/. [Accessed: 18 March

[31] Oyebode O. Weak-kneed media and festering corruption in Nigeria. Journal of International and Global Studies.

[32] Gómez E, Sandoval-Martín M. Interest and willingness to pay for investigative reporting: A solution for the crisis of journalism?

Communications Society.

from: https://arij.net/%D8%B9% D9%86-%D8%A7%D8%B1%

[30] Stapenhurst R. The Media's Role in Curbing Corruption. World Bank Institute. Washington, DC: International Bank for Reconstruction

and Development; 2000

2017;**8**(2):34-49

2016;**29**(1):1-19

2019]

**78**

## A Theory of Corruption and Productivity Growth

*Oluremi Davies Ogun*

#### **Abstract**

This chapter was a theoretical construct on corruption within the context of long-run growth. It stressed and expounded the quality implications of corrupt practices for full capacity output. Rational behavior of economic agents was assumed and the typical capitalist economy was the setting. The ultimate channel of the effect of corruption on long-run growth was a declining total factor productivity growth that in turn caused the full information natural rate level of output to fall below full capacity output. Both the investment and human capital transmission mechanisms of corruptive practices were focused with trappings of institutional corruption discernible in the two cases. Different permutations and likely results were indicated and analyzed. The overall conclusion was that corruption was undesirable from the perspective of long-run growth.

**Keywords:** corruption, total factor productivity growth, long-run growth, environment and growth, public policy **JEL Codes:** A11, A13, A23, 044, Z18

#### **1. Introduction**

Most studies on corruption stressed its growth penalizing impact (see, e.g., [1–4]). Three channels of effect were common in the literature, viz. human capital, institutions, and investment (e.g., [5]). In the majority of cases, the short-run effect was emphasized. However, in a recent publication, [6] developed a theoretical model to underpin the passive understanding that corruption lowered the marginal product of capital, hence, the growth of the economy. The channel of effect emphasized in the study was a reduced return on investment via an arbitrary tax. By this, corruption adversely affected the productivity (and, thus, productivity growth) of private capital, thereby, implicitly, impacting long-run growth.<sup>1</sup>

In the present chapter, the long-run effect of corruption was emphasized. The investment channel was retained but the route differed: investment quality rather than tax effect was stressed. Additionally, the human capital or labor productivity channel was developed to show that a significant fall in total factor productivity growth would be the ultimate result of corrupt practices. In the two cases, trappings of institutional corruption were discernible. Different permutations and likely results were analyzed. In Section 2 of the chapter, the model was presented with a

<sup>1</sup> Ordinarily, productivity is a level concept but, under a "continuous context" assumption, it turns into a growth factor.

particular discussion of its premise and general features as well as the different possible scenarios. Section 3 provided some concluding remarks.

#### **2. The model**

#### **2.1 The premise and general context**

This model was applied to the typical capitalist economy where corrupt practices were visible or usually exposed and thus not always hidden. The representative agents, firms and workers, were assumed to be rational. The basic premise was that corruption caused the full information natural level of output to fall below the full capacity output via its productivity growth impact.<sup>2</sup> This was depicted in **Figure 1**. In the diagrammatic representation, LRAS was long-run aggregate supply curve, Y0 was full information natural rate level of output at which the aggregate demand for and supply of labor were equal, Y\* was full capacity output at which all employable resources were fully and optimally engaged, and AD0 and AS0 were referred to aggregate demand and supply curves, respectively.

Now, consider a typical endogenous production function such as below:

$$Y = AK^aL^{1-a} \tag{1}$$

*<sup>Y</sup>* <sup>¼</sup> *AK<sup>α</sup>L*1�*<sup>α</sup>Le<sup>ω</sup>* (2)

where *ω* was a parameter/elasticity corresponding to the externality term that

The assumption of increasing returns of the endogenous model ensured that in steady state, changes in each of the right-hand-side variables with respect to output

Corruption affected factor inputs, capital (*K*), and labor (*L*) negatively, neutralizing the effect of the knowledge component of capital (*K*) and turning negative the externality from human capital (*Le*Þ. Thus, the gains from both the stock of knowledge and human capital development were negative somewhat, returning the

The channel of effect of corruption on capital was the reduction in output quality that lowered capital's marginal product (MPK), hence, the average return on capital investment. For labor, work effort declined as workers were discouraged. Accordingly, the marginal product of labor (MPL), hence, the average return on labor investment, fell. The sum total of these outcomes was a falling total factor productivity growth. This translated to declining long-run output growth.

So far, the analysis had assumed perfect and full information dissemination,

Besides the general case discussed above, several other permutations were

reduced by the extent of the nil labor productivity effect.

*dk* <sup>&</sup>gt; 0 and *dy*

information, output growth would suffer greatly as

*dle* <sup>&</sup>lt; 0 and *dy*

a.Where corruption was widespread (endemic) and accepted as "a way of life." There would be no effect on labor productivity, but capital productivity (MPK) would fall as in the general case.<sup>3</sup> Thus, the steady-state impact would be

b.Where corruption was considered undesirable but its incidence was restricted to the top echelon of government and there was often a time lag in labor's knowledge of its occurrence. In the short run, output growth would not be

c. Where corruption was considered undesirable and information about its occurrence spread rapidly.<sup>4</sup> Both the short-run and long-run effects would be

<sup>3</sup> The prediction on labor productivity was influenced by the probability of people not feeling cheated in the circumstance. However, the case submission might not be without qualification: to the extent that resources meant for labor skills' improvement were diverted or embezzled, labor's contribution

<sup>4</sup> Cases associated with institutional corruption resulting from avoidable but sustained bureaucracy as in business registration, licensing, permits, and kickbacks in contract awards, readily became public knowledge. It could be argued though that the first three types of corrupt practices noted above would only generate level effect being "a once in a firm's lifetime payments," the case of kickback appeared different. The ensuing poor quality of output (firm's products) had welfare implication and also wasted

*dl* > 0*:* In the long run, with perfect

*dle*<sup>2</sup> <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*:* Such a long-run outcome was clearly that of

was expected to positively influence output growth.

*A Theory of Corruption and Productivity Growth DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84869*

process to that of diminishing long-run returns.

situations otherwise were examined in Section 2.2.

adversely affected as *dy*

*dl*<sup>2</sup> <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*; dy*

double growth jeopardy.

(potential) to long-run growth would fall.

public funds as the same contract was awarded repeatedly.

**2.2 Cases**

possible:

*dy dk*<sup>2</sup> <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*; dy*

**81**

continued to be positive, that is, a positive second derivative.

where *Y* was the output, A was an exogenous constant and *K* was stock of physical capital and improvement to that stock from knowledge acquisition; *L* was stock of human capital; and *α* and 1 � *α* were respective parameters or elasticities corresponding to *K* and *L*. The first-order condition for output maximization was that *dy dk* <sup>&</sup>gt; <sup>0</sup>*; dy dl* > 0.

An additional term capturing the externality from average human capital could be incorporated into the function such that

<sup>2</sup> Other factors that could produce similar result include regimes of high income taxes and cost of regulation. For further details, see [7].

*A Theory of Corruption and Productivity Growth DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84869*

$$Y = AK^a L^{1-a} L e^a \tag{2}$$

where *ω* was a parameter/elasticity corresponding to the externality term that was expected to positively influence output growth.

The assumption of increasing returns of the endogenous model ensured that in steady state, changes in each of the right-hand-side variables with respect to output continued to be positive, that is, a positive second derivative.

Corruption affected factor inputs, capital (*K*), and labor (*L*) negatively, neutralizing the effect of the knowledge component of capital (*K*) and turning negative the externality from human capital (*Le*Þ. Thus, the gains from both the stock of knowledge and human capital development were negative somewhat, returning the process to that of diminishing long-run returns.

The channel of effect of corruption on capital was the reduction in output quality that lowered capital's marginal product (MPK), hence, the average return on capital investment. For labor, work effort declined as workers were discouraged. Accordingly, the marginal product of labor (MPL), hence, the average return on labor investment, fell. The sum total of these outcomes was a falling total factor productivity growth. This translated to declining long-run output growth.

So far, the analysis had assumed perfect and full information dissemination, situations otherwise were examined in Section 2.2.

#### **2.2 Cases**

particular discussion of its premise and general features as well as the different

This model was applied to the typical capitalist economy where corrupt practices

were visible or usually exposed and thus not always hidden. The representative agents, firms and workers, were assumed to be rational. The basic premise was that corruption caused the full information natural level of output to fall below the full capacity output via its productivity growth impact.<sup>2</sup> This was depicted in **Figure 1**. In the diagrammatic representation, LRAS was long-run aggregate supply curve, Y0 was full information natural rate level of output at which the aggregate demand for and supply of labor were equal, Y\* was full capacity output at which all employable resources were fully and optimally engaged, and AD0 and AS0 were referred to

Now, consider a typical endogenous production function such as below:

where *Y* was the output, A was an exogenous constant and *K* was stock of physical capital and improvement to that stock from knowledge acquisition; *L* was stock of human capital; and *α* and 1 � *α* were respective parameters or elasticities corresponding to *K* and *L*. The first-order condition for output maximization was

An additional term capturing the externality from average human capital could

*Full information level of output versus full capacity output. Source: Adapted from [7].*

<sup>2</sup> Other factors that could produce similar result include regimes of high income taxes and cost of

*<sup>Y</sup>* <sup>¼</sup> *AKαL*<sup>1</sup>�*<sup>α</sup>* (1)

possible scenarios. Section 3 provided some concluding remarks.

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

**2. The model**

that *dy*

**Figure 1.**

**80**

regulation. For further details, see [7].

*dk* <sup>&</sup>gt; <sup>0</sup>*; dy*

*dl* > 0.

be incorporated into the function such that

**2.1 The premise and general context**

aggregate demand and supply curves, respectively.

Besides the general case discussed above, several other permutations were possible:


<sup>3</sup> The prediction on labor productivity was influenced by the probability of people not feeling cheated in the circumstance. However, the case submission might not be without qualification: to the extent that resources meant for labor skills' improvement were diverted or embezzled, labor's contribution (potential) to long-run growth would fall.

<sup>4</sup> Cases associated with institutional corruption resulting from avoidable but sustained bureaucracy as in business registration, licensing, permits, and kickbacks in contract awards, readily became public knowledge. It could be argued though that the first three types of corrupt practices noted above would only generate level effect being "a once in a firm's lifetime payments," the case of kickback appeared different. The ensuing poor quality of output (firm's products) had welfare implication and also wasted public funds as the same contract was awarded repeatedly.

similar as *dy dk* <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*; dy dl* <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*; dy dle* <sup>&</sup>lt; 0 and *dy dk*<sup>2</sup> <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*; dy dl*<sup>2</sup> <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*; dy dle*<sup>2</sup> <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*:* <sup>5</sup> Thus, rapid information dissemination as aided by the phenomenal growth of social media could facilitate this outcome. It could similarly constitute the missing link in non-capitalist countries where press freedom was restricted and the growth of social media severely circumscribed. Hence, the short-run and long-run effect of corruptive practices associated with this particular case might be quite different in such economies.

degree of press freedom, and the sophistication of economic agents including firms and labor. Accordingly, five scenarios of different possible permutations were identified and analyzed. The consensus from this exercise was that corruption could be very harmful to economic growth and within the context of endogenous growth

In conclusion, it should be realized that the model developed in this chapter was only designed to ginger deep thought on the extent of the growth impact of corrupt practices. Quite clearly, further studies could provide different theoretical valida-

The author gratefully acknowledges, without implicating, comments from an

An abridged version appeared as research note under the title, "Corruption and Long-run Growth: A Framework" in International Advances in Economic Research,

model, it could significantly erode the gains.

*A Theory of Corruption and Productivity Growth DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84869*

**Acknowledgements**

anonymous reviewer.

20(2). 2014:245-46.

**Author details**

**83**

Oluremi Davies Ogun

University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria

provided the original work is properly cited.

\*Address all correspondence to: r\_ogun@yahoo.com

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,

**Author note**

tions and/or empirical tests of the various propositions.


#### **3. Concluding observations**

This chapter had been concerned with the modalities of the impact of corruption on long-run growth in respect of which the explicit literature was nonexistent. The basic premise on which the discussion and analysis were anchored was that corruption penalized long-run growth by causing total factor productivity growth to fall. The ultimate result was that the natural rate level of output fell below the full capacity output.

It was thus clear from the analysis that notwithstanding the fact that an economy experienced full employment, its long-run growth could still be endangered by corrupt practices. However, the extent to which the basic result in this chapter was obtained depended crucially on the circumstances of each economy especially the state of its moral and ethical philosophy, the effectiveness of law and order, the

<sup>5</sup> This did not suggest that output would not change (grow) at all; after all, the expenditure approach to gross national income (GNI) guaranteed a rise in nominal output from such government spending. However, incremental addition to output would fall dragging down output (real) growth. In the long run, with the decline in product quality properly accounted for, the fall in output could be cumulative if not multiplicative.

<sup>6</sup> The practice in some countries of influencing journalists' choice/content of news feature (through "brown envelope" or other forms of inducement) could produce an effect similar to scenario (b) or (c) depending on the speed at which "covered corruptive practices" became public knowledge.

*A Theory of Corruption and Productivity Growth DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84869*

degree of press freedom, and the sophistication of economic agents including firms and labor. Accordingly, five scenarios of different possible permutations were identified and analyzed. The consensus from this exercise was that corruption could be very harmful to economic growth and within the context of endogenous growth model, it could significantly erode the gains.

In conclusion, it should be realized that the model developed in this chapter was only designed to ginger deep thought on the extent of the growth impact of corrupt practices. Quite clearly, further studies could provide different theoretical validations and/or empirical tests of the various propositions.

#### **Acknowledgements**

The author gratefully acknowledges, without implicating, comments from an anonymous reviewer.

#### **Author note**

similar as *dy*

*dy dle*<sup>2</sup> > < <sup>0</sup>*:*

6

*dk* <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*; dy*

different in such economies.

(a) or (b) also obtained. In general, *dy*

Long-run growth suffered accordingly. Thus, *dy*

run externality from human capital, that is, *dy*

return on labor investment.

**3. Concluding observations**

capacity output.

not multiplicative.

**82**

*dl* <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*; dy*

*dle* <sup>&</sup>lt; 0 and *dy*

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

*dk*<sup>2</sup> <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*; dy*

information dissemination as aided by the phenomenal growth of social media could facilitate this outcome. It could similarly constitute the missing link in non-capitalist countries where press freedom was restricted and the growth of social media severely circumscribed. Hence, the short-run and long-run effect of corruptive practices associated with this particular case might be quite

d.Where the representative agent (i.e., the firm) had information about the practice prior to bidding for the contract. The contract sum would be enhanced or increased by the extra payment made under the kickback arrangement. This reduced the average efficiency of (hence, return on) capital, dragging down long-run growth accordingly. Short run growth might not suffer backlash in this case, while the effect on labor productivity depended on whether scenario

*dk* > < <sup>0</sup>*; dy*

e.Where the representative agent had no prior information before bidding and was compelled to make the kickback payment out of the contract sum. Most likely, the agent, being rational, would reduce the quality of his/her product(s) in order to recover the amount paid and also protect profit margin. This would cause MPK and, macro-economically, the average returns to capital to fall.

depending on which of scenarios (a) and (b) also applied. The short- and long-

This chapter had been concerned with the modalities of the impact of corruption on long-run growth in respect of which the explicit literature was nonexistent. The basic premise on which the discussion and analysis were anchored was that corruption penalized long-run growth by causing total factor productivity growth to fall. The ultimate result was that the natural rate level of output fell below the full

It was thus clear from the analysis that notwithstanding the fact that an economy

experienced full employment, its long-run growth could still be endangered by corrupt practices. However, the extent to which the basic result in this chapter was obtained depended crucially on the circumstances of each economy especially the state of its moral and ethical philosophy, the effectiveness of law and order, the

<sup>5</sup> This did not suggest that output would not change (grow) at all; after all, the expenditure approach to gross national income (GNI) guaranteed a rise in nominal output from such government spending. However, incremental addition to output would fall dragging down output (real) growth. In the long run, with the decline in product quality properly accounted for, the fall in output could be cumulative if

<sup>6</sup> The practice in some countries of influencing journalists' choice/content of news feature (through "brown envelope" or other forms of inducement) could produce an effect similar to scenario (b) or (c)

depending on the speed at which "covered corruptive practices" became public knowledge.

*dk*<sup>2</sup> <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*; dy*

*dk* <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*; dy*

*dle and dy*

*dl* and *dy*

*dk*<sup>2</sup> <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*; dy*

*dl*<sup>2</sup> > < <sup>0</sup>*; dy*

*dl and dy*

*dle*2, followed the trend of

*dle* and

*dl*<sup>2</sup> > < <sup>0</sup>

*dl*<sup>2</sup> <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*; dy*

*dle*<sup>2</sup> <sup>&</sup>lt; <sup>0</sup>*:*

<sup>5</sup> Thus, rapid

An abridged version appeared as research note under the title, "Corruption and Long-run Growth: A Framework" in International Advances in Economic Research, 20(2). 2014:245-46.

#### **Author details**

Oluremi Davies Ogun University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria

\*Address all correspondence to: r\_ogun@yahoo.com

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

### **References**

[1] Murphy K, Shleifer A, Vishny R. The allocation of talent: Implication for growth. Quarterly Journal of Economics. 1991;**106**:503-530. DOI: 10.2307/ 2937945

[2] Murphy K, Shleifer A, Vishny R. Why is rent-seeking so costly to growth? The American Economic Review. 1993; **83**:409-414

[3] Mauro P. Corruption and growth. Quarterly Journal of Economics. 1995; **110**:681-712. DOI: 10.2307/2946696

[4] Asiedu E, Freeman J. The effect of corruption on investment and growth: Evidence from firms in Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa, and transition countries. Review of Development Economics. 2009;**13**:200-214. DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9361.2009.00507.x

[5] Anorou E, Braha H. Corruption and Economic Growth: The African Experience. 2005. Available from: http://www.jsdafrica.com/Jsda/Spring 2005/ArticlePDF/Arc\_Corruption% 20and%20Economic%20Growth.pdf

[6] Dissou Y, Yakaustava T. Corruption, growth and taxation. Theoretical Economics Letters. 2012;**2**(1):62-66. DOI: 10.4236/tel.2012.21011

[7] Miller RL, Vanhoose DD. Modern Money and Banking. 3rd ed. New York & Co: McGraw-Hill Inc; 1993

**85**

**Chapter 5**

**Abstract**

*Chipo Kanjo*

**1. Introduction**

scholars have argued that:

Poverty by Design: The Role of ICT

While extant research has focused on the role of information and communication technology (ICT) in promoting development, consequently reducing poverty, less effort has been committed to examining the role of ICT in aggravating poverty. A descriptive research design method using the qualitative approach was used in the case of developing country context of Malawi. We argue that ICT can also be used as a tool that derails development, thereby aggravating poverty—directly or indirectly. It is not a question of possessing the ICTs, but rather it is more of how and what the ICTs are used for. At the end of the day, it is the poor people that become victims. We use concepts from Bourdieu's theory (1997) to discuss how poverty is aggravated by ICT when embezzled public funds (economic capital) were squandered in personal overspending (cultural capital). The amassed economic capital led to socioeconomic success (social capital), for a few, who became more influential in society. We conclude that the more institutionalized the practice became, the more

public funds were drained affecting a number of pro-poor initiatives.

the Cashgate scandal, poverty aggravator, the Habitus

ing the ICTs, it is more of how and what the ICTs are used for.

**Keywords:** ICT and poverty, poverty by design, Bourdieu's theory and poverty,

Over the years, there has been a lot of literature on the discourse of the role of information and communication technology (ICT) in poverty reduction [1–4]. Two schools of thought have emerged. One school of thought argues that ICTs enhance economic growth, consequently reducing poverty. The other school of thought argues that ICTs entrench inequalities as it aggravates the digital divide, leading to social exclusion [5]. A question that has been asked in many literature is "what is the role of the ICT in poverty reduction?" This paper brings in another perspective of ICT as it examines the role of ICT in aggravating poverty. In this paper, we argue that ICT plays a big role in assisting humans to pursue their plans of perpetrating poverty to a larger population be it directly or indirectly, ending up having a situation where poverty is aggravated. We argue that much as ICT is used as a tool for development, it can equally be used as a tool to derail development. It is not a question of possess-

This study examines the role of ICT in aggravating poverty, focusing on the identification of practices in a form of informal procedures, behaviors, and patterns, and explores the impact those practices have on poverty augmentation. Other

Poverty can only be fought in the presence of strong institutions, and equitable distribution of resources. This requires a non-corrupt government. However, in Africa, programmes designed to fight poverty are not fully implemented because

#### **Chapter 5**

**References**

2937945

**83**:409-414

[1] Murphy K, Shleifer A, Vishny R. The allocation of talent: Implication for growth. Quarterly Journal of Economics.

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

1991;**106**:503-530. DOI: 10.2307/

[2] Murphy K, Shleifer A, Vishny R. Why is rent-seeking so costly to growth? The American Economic Review. 1993;

[3] Mauro P. Corruption and growth. Quarterly Journal of Economics. 1995; **110**:681-712. DOI: 10.2307/2946696

[4] Asiedu E, Freeman J. The effect of corruption on investment and growth: Evidence from firms in Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa, and transition countries. Review of Development Economics. 2009;**13**:200-214. DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9361.2009.00507.x

[5] Anorou E, Braha H. Corruption and Economic Growth: The African Experience. 2005. Available from: http://www.jsdafrica.com/Jsda/Spring 2005/ArticlePDF/Arc\_Corruption% 20and%20Economic%20Growth.pdf

[6] Dissou Y, Yakaustava T. Corruption, growth and taxation. Theoretical Economics Letters. 2012;**2**(1):62-66.

[7] Miller RL, Vanhoose DD. Modern Money and Banking. 3rd ed. New York

DOI: 10.4236/tel.2012.21011

& Co: McGraw-Hill Inc; 1993

**84**

## Poverty by Design: The Role of ICT

*Chipo Kanjo*

#### **Abstract**

While extant research has focused on the role of information and communication technology (ICT) in promoting development, consequently reducing poverty, less effort has been committed to examining the role of ICT in aggravating poverty. A descriptive research design method using the qualitative approach was used in the case of developing country context of Malawi. We argue that ICT can also be used as a tool that derails development, thereby aggravating poverty—directly or indirectly. It is not a question of possessing the ICTs, but rather it is more of how and what the ICTs are used for. At the end of the day, it is the poor people that become victims. We use concepts from Bourdieu's theory (1997) to discuss how poverty is aggravated by ICT when embezzled public funds (economic capital) were squandered in personal overspending (cultural capital). The amassed economic capital led to socioeconomic success (social capital), for a few, who became more influential in society. We conclude that the more institutionalized the practice became, the more public funds were drained affecting a number of pro-poor initiatives.

**Keywords:** ICT and poverty, poverty by design, Bourdieu's theory and poverty, the Cashgate scandal, poverty aggravator, the Habitus

#### **1. Introduction**

Over the years, there has been a lot of literature on the discourse of the role of information and communication technology (ICT) in poverty reduction [1–4]. Two schools of thought have emerged. One school of thought argues that ICTs enhance economic growth, consequently reducing poverty. The other school of thought argues that ICTs entrench inequalities as it aggravates the digital divide, leading to social exclusion [5]. A question that has been asked in many literature is "what is the role of the ICT in poverty reduction?" This paper brings in another perspective of ICT as it examines the role of ICT in aggravating poverty. In this paper, we argue that ICT plays a big role in assisting humans to pursue their plans of perpetrating poverty to a larger population be it directly or indirectly, ending up having a situation where poverty is aggravated. We argue that much as ICT is used as a tool for development, it can equally be used as a tool to derail development. It is not a question of possessing the ICTs, it is more of how and what the ICTs are used for.

This study examines the role of ICT in aggravating poverty, focusing on the identification of practices in a form of informal procedures, behaviors, and patterns, and explores the impact those practices have on poverty augmentation. Other scholars have argued that:

Poverty can only be fought in the presence of strong institutions, and equitable distribution of resources. This requires a non-corrupt government. However, in Africa, programmes designed to fight poverty are not fully implemented because

the funds end up in the hands of corrupt individuals, who pocket the majority. Again due to poor governance, those in authority have failed to apprehend the corrupt. This creates an imbalance in society and leads to more poverty because you end up with a few influential and powerful individuals oppressing the poor (who are the majority) ([6], p. 151).

The statement above is a good premise why we argue that ICT, if not properly utilized, can aggravate poverty, particularly in cases where governance institutions are weak and those in authority fail to apprehend the corrupt. We use the case of the malawi integrated financial management information system (IFMIS) usage, an ICT that led to the *cashgate* scandal where billions of Kwachas were looted in the year 2013 [7]. We argue our case using Bourdieu's [8] theory who delineates three fundamental forms of capital: economic capital, which is readily convertible; social capital, which is comprised of social connections; and cultural capital can be embodied, objectified, and institutionalized [9].

#### **2. Literature review**

The nature of the relationship between ICTs and poverty remains unclear as the statistical analysis of the impact of ICTs on dimensions of poverty and the mechanisms through which ICTs contribute toward poverty reduction directly are yet to be established [10]. However, Adera et al. [10] strongly recommend that governments should invest in ICTs. This chapter analyzes how such ICT initiatives aggravated poverty instead of reducing it. In this section, we discuss the role of ICT in reducing and aggravating poverty, poverty dimensions and causes, and how Bourdieu's theory of society relates to poverty. This approach broadens the understanding of how ICTs can aggravate poverty by taking into account the context, human factors, and all the different dimensions causing poverty.

#### **2.1 ICT and poverty**

There are two schools of thought on the impact of ICTs on societies; while some view it as an enabler of economic growth, others view it as a tool that further entrenches inequalities and digital divide [5], consequently aggravating poverty. Some argue that the digital divide is not the root cause but rather a symptom of poverty [5, 11].

#### *2.1.1 The role of ICT in poverty reduction*

Mostly, ICT is portrayed as an enabler of development in different perspectives which include a vector of social development and transformation [4, 12]. Mogotlhwane et al. [13] illustrate how ICT has made strides in poverty reduction in Botswana, whereas Ponelis and Holmner [14] share evidence of ICT as an enabler from Benin, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Mozambique, and Ghana; and Kelles-Viitanen [15] shares experience from Kenya where the Naushad Trading Company saw their revenue grow from USD 10,000 to USD 2 million in 2 years. Sachs [16] also alludes to the fact that ICT is the most powerful new tool for solving the world's major challenges, including ending poverty. In their book, Adera et al. [10] came up with substantial contribution that there is a direct association between that ICTs have a direct impact on poverty reduction.

#### *2.1.2 The role of ICT in poverty aggravation*

On the other hand, Dutta et al. [17] have a different school of thought where they suggest that ICTs have opened up new digital divides since the opportunities offered

**87**

move out of poverty" [28].

**2.3 Poverty and economic growth**

*Poverty by Design: The Role of ICT*

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86280*

**2.2 Poverty dimensions and causes**

to contribute to a non-inclusive type of growth. They further argue that segments of the population may be exposed differently than others ending up aggravating inequalities across groups with different levels of skills. Battista et al. [18] emphasize the lack of inclusivity as the ICTs are far from being ubiquitous and are not spreading as quickly as many believe [18, 19]. It is also argued that when it comes to poverty, low technology (ICTs) is considered to be one of the causes, coupled with inadequate capital, manpower problems, poor infrastructural development, underutilization of natural resources, poor policy execution by government, instability of government, and poor attitude of the citizenry to work with government [16, 20]. Habito [21] is also of the view that technology has contributed to worsening economic poverty and widening income inequality. Habito [21] further argue that those who believe that technology improves lives should at the same time qualify whose lives, particularly in

situations where there are disparities between the "haves" and "have-nots."

May et al. [19] questioned whether investments in ICT represent a worthwhile option for poor communities considering that there is a myriad of other necessities, with high priorities that are required but may not be affordable. It is the non-affordable necessities that can be handled with whatever resources the government has, the more reason why the government funds need to be guarded carefully to avoid misuse.

Poverty is when a person falls below the standard of life thought appropriate for that particular society. It is seen as a lack of adequate economic capacities [22]. Poverty can affect either individuals or society as a whole and is believed to emanate from "situations where gross inequality in the ownership of assets persists because of vested interests and entrenched power structures" [23]. Some scholars have argued that poverty is caused by attitude [24], while others [25] argue that "the number one killer of some African states development and the economy has been wasting public funds and aid money on white elephant projects." The wastage has been categorized into either wastage done deliberately to siphon state funds unwisely to enrich others or wastage due to lack of coherent government policy [25]. The lack of good governance, coupled with inadequate legislation and enforcement of such legislation, aggravates the poverty situation [15]. Research conducted in Pakistan, a developing country, revealed that poverty can be caused by factors such as high population, low GDP, floods, corruption in society, and backwardness in agriculture [26] of all the continents, Africa is associated with poverty the most. There are different schools of thought as to why Africa remains the poorest. One school of thought is that people refuse to accept the reality of hard work and always expect world leaders to act and do something about Africa's plight [25]. Another school of thought by the famous televangelist Prophet T.B. Joshua is that Africa would come out of poverty if they were to exchange their minerals and other raw resources with technology, equipment, and machinery instead of dollars (money) [27]. His argument is that availability of technology and machinery can create job opportunities, while the dollars can enhance corruption. Joshua's argument is supported by sustainable development goal 1 which states that technology like ICT is "key to helping end poverty by providing possibilities to improve productivity among millions of people so that they can better provide for themselves and their families and

The relationship between economic growth and poverty is quite complex [15]; while economic growth is necessary, it is not sufficient when it comes to poverty reduction as certain prerequisites need to be in place. For example, if poor people do

#### *Poverty by Design: The Role of ICT DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86280*

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

are the majority) ([6], p. 151).

**2. Literature review**

**2.1 ICT and poverty**

*2.1.1 The role of ICT in poverty reduction*

*2.1.2 The role of ICT in poverty aggravation*

embodied, objectified, and institutionalized [9].

the funds end up in the hands of corrupt individuals, who pocket the majority. Again due to poor governance, those in authority have failed to apprehend the corrupt. This creates an imbalance in society and leads to more poverty because you end up with a few influential and powerful individuals oppressing the poor (who

The statement above is a good premise why we argue that ICT, if not properly utilized, can aggravate poverty, particularly in cases where governance institutions are weak and those in authority fail to apprehend the corrupt. We use the case of the malawi integrated financial management information system (IFMIS) usage, an ICT that led to the *cashgate* scandal where billions of Kwachas were looted in the year 2013 [7]. We argue our case using Bourdieu's [8] theory who delineates three fundamental forms of capital: economic capital, which is readily convertible; social capital, which is comprised of social connections; and cultural capital can be

The nature of the relationship between ICTs and poverty remains unclear as the statistical analysis of the impact of ICTs on dimensions of poverty and the mechanisms through which ICTs contribute toward poverty reduction directly are yet to be established [10]. However, Adera et al. [10] strongly recommend that governments should invest in ICTs. This chapter analyzes how such ICT initiatives aggravated poverty instead of reducing it. In this section, we discuss the role of ICT in reducing and aggravating poverty, poverty dimensions and causes, and how Bourdieu's theory of society relates to poverty. This approach broadens the understanding of how ICTs can aggravate poverty by taking into account the context,

There are two schools of thought on the impact of ICTs on societies; while some view it as an enabler of economic growth, others view it as a tool that further entrenches inequalities and digital divide [5], consequently aggravating poverty. Some argue that

Mostly, ICT is portrayed as an enabler of development in different perspectives which include a vector of social development and transformation [4, 12]. Mogotlhwane et al. [13] illustrate how ICT has made strides in poverty reduction in Botswana, whereas Ponelis and Holmner [14] share evidence of ICT as an enabler from Benin, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Mozambique, and Ghana; and Kelles-Viitanen [15] shares experience from Kenya where the Naushad Trading Company saw their revenue grow from USD 10,000 to USD 2 million in 2 years. Sachs [16] also alludes to the fact that ICT is the most powerful new tool for solving the world's major challenges, including ending poverty. In their book, Adera et al. [10] came up with substantial contribution that there is a direct

On the other hand, Dutta et al. [17] have a different school of thought where they suggest that ICTs have opened up new digital divides since the opportunities offered

the digital divide is not the root cause but rather a symptom of poverty [5, 11].

association between that ICTs have a direct impact on poverty reduction.

human factors, and all the different dimensions causing poverty.

**86**

to contribute to a non-inclusive type of growth. They further argue that segments of the population may be exposed differently than others ending up aggravating inequalities across groups with different levels of skills. Battista et al. [18] emphasize the lack of inclusivity as the ICTs are far from being ubiquitous and are not spreading as quickly as many believe [18, 19]. It is also argued that when it comes to poverty, low technology (ICTs) is considered to be one of the causes, coupled with inadequate capital, manpower problems, poor infrastructural development, underutilization of natural resources, poor policy execution by government, instability of government, and poor attitude of the citizenry to work with government [16, 20]. Habito [21] is also of the view that technology has contributed to worsening economic poverty and widening income inequality. Habito [21] further argue that those who believe that technology improves lives should at the same time qualify whose lives, particularly in situations where there are disparities between the "haves" and "have-nots."

May et al. [19] questioned whether investments in ICT represent a worthwhile option for poor communities considering that there is a myriad of other necessities, with high priorities that are required but may not be affordable. It is the non-affordable necessities that can be handled with whatever resources the government has, the more reason why the government funds need to be guarded carefully to avoid misuse.

#### **2.2 Poverty dimensions and causes**

Poverty is when a person falls below the standard of life thought appropriate for that particular society. It is seen as a lack of adequate economic capacities [22]. Poverty can affect either individuals or society as a whole and is believed to emanate from "situations where gross inequality in the ownership of assets persists because of vested interests and entrenched power structures" [23]. Some scholars have argued that poverty is caused by attitude [24], while others [25] argue that "the number one killer of some African states development and the economy has been wasting public funds and aid money on white elephant projects." The wastage has been categorized into either wastage done deliberately to siphon state funds unwisely to enrich others or wastage due to lack of coherent government policy [25]. The lack of good governance, coupled with inadequate legislation and enforcement of such legislation, aggravates the poverty situation [15]. Research conducted in Pakistan, a developing country, revealed that poverty can be caused by factors such as high population, low GDP, floods, corruption in society, and backwardness in agriculture [26] of all the continents, Africa is associated with poverty the most. There are different schools of thought as to why Africa remains the poorest. One school of thought is that people refuse to accept the reality of hard work and always expect world leaders to act and do something about Africa's plight [25]. Another school of thought by the famous televangelist Prophet T.B. Joshua is that Africa would come out of poverty if they were to exchange their minerals and other raw resources with technology, equipment, and machinery instead of dollars (money) [27]. His argument is that availability of technology and machinery can create job opportunities, while the dollars can enhance corruption. Joshua's argument is supported by sustainable development goal 1 which states that technology like ICT is "key to helping end poverty by providing possibilities to improve productivity among millions of people so that they can better provide for themselves and their families and move out of poverty" [28].

#### **2.3 Poverty and economic growth**

The relationship between economic growth and poverty is quite complex [15]; while economic growth is necessary, it is not sufficient when it comes to poverty reduction as certain prerequisites need to be in place. For example, if poor people do not have access to basic education, it would be difficult for them to take advantage of employment and income opportunities created by economic growth. Equally, if educated people do not have sufficient money, they remain poor. Similarly, the discriminated and socially excluded people cannot take advantage of the economic growth [15]. Additionally, if poor people (or indeed all people) are not of good health, they may not be able to contribute to or take advantage of economic growth.

Kelles-Viitanen [15] argues that ICT can only contribute to poverty reduction if it is tailored to the needs of the poor and used in the right way and for the right purposes. Kelles-Viitanen [15] adds that ICT is only capable of offering tools and applications but not solutions. "Poverty is the result of economic, political and social processes that interact with each other and frequently reinforce each other". Of interest in this paper is the social processes that, if not properly monitored and evaluated, can provide loopholes where ICT as a tool can be abused and used in a manner that aggravates poverty.

In Europe, when the Second World War wreaked havoc, the infusion of massive aid by America performed the required recovery [29]. This raises questions of why it is that Africa has never recovered despite years of foreign aid intervention. A number of factors that slow down development and economic growth in Africa are raised; these include excessive expectation of foreign aid [24, 29], which results in passive response to self-help efforts and initiatives; wasting public funds and aid money on white elephant projects; and failure of citizens to question their governments when there is unwarranted public expenditure and wastage. When aid money is misused, it aggravates poverty levels more since most of the "foreign aids are loans that are payable as debt" [29].

#### **2.4 Poverty and the environment**

The environment, in this case, refers to our surroundings and the culture therein. Ngom [30] argues that the African man and woman, in the immense majority of cases, have not yet entered the era of individualism, we remain prisoners and often victims of the family. We remain prisoners in Africa due to the ravages of social parasitism, the rapacity of cousins and those who are called brothers. This is true at all levels of society, power, and social hierarchy and it prompts one to become corrupt as the extended family comes down on your savings and your livelihood. Therefore, "without the omnipresence of the family in Africa, corruption would be the same level as in Europe or Asia, because there are real corrupt everywhere on the planet" [30]. In their research findings, Lyimo-Macha and Kaijage [31] found that household poverty influences the existence of extended families, a thing which makes the one providing support remain a prisoner. This supports Ngom's arguments.

#### **2.5 Attitudes that aggravate poverty**

The way African poverty situation is talked about at political levels gives the impression that poverty on the continent is a permanent situation and not resolvable. This perspective has been accepted because most Africans leaders are happy with the poverty levels in the hope of getting foreign aid. As such, they have refused to make the needed effort required to dispel such an impression. They leave their citizens doing nothing to convince foreign donors that the situation demands external aid as a solution. Narayan [24] argues that poverty is caused by attitude and can only be fought in the presence of strong institutions. On the other hand, the presence of the strong institutions requires a non-corrupt government [6]. Africans fail to make efforts to dispel the poverty impression in the hope of receiving foreign

**89**

scandal.

*Poverty by Design: The Role of ICT*

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86280*

**2.6 Bourdieu's theory and poverty**

accumulate [33].

reproduced unconsciously.

**3. Methodology**

stances" ([35], p. 9).

capital within a particular social domain [33].

aid [24]; when that aid arrives, the programs designed to fight poverty in Africa are

Bourdieu theory of society [8] is used in this paper. We found Bourdieu's concepts useful in highlighting the interplay between economic, social, and cultural empowerments within our environments. Bourdieu [8] delineates three fundamental forms of capital: economic, social, and cultural capital. While economic capital is convertible, social capital comprises social connections, while cultural capital can be embodied, objectified, and institutionalized [9]. Bourdieu [8] sees the forms of capital as mutually constitutive in that economic capital affords the time and resources for investment in the development of cultural capital and socioeconomic success. One's social network can be broader, more influential, and more conducive to opportunity and further enhancement of other capital stocks. Further, these forms of capital can be accumulated and transferred from one arena to another [32]. The shift from material to cultural and symbolic forms of capital is to a large extent what hides the causes of inequality [32]. Capital is accumulated labor which, when appropriated, enables one to appropriate social energy in the form of living labor [33]. Capital makes the games of society—the economic game—something other than simple games of chance offering at every moment the possibility of a miracle [33]. Capital also takes time to

Bourdieu's approach is useful in analyzing power in development and social change processes [32]. Bourdieu sees the power in the lens of *habitus*. Habitus is the way society becomes placed in persons in the form of lasting dispositions [32], the learned set of preferences or dispositions by which a person orients to the social world [34]. It is rooted in family upbringing, created through a social rather than individual process [32], and conditioned by one's position in the social structure. Habitus shapes the parameters of people's sense of agency [9]. In this sense, habitus is created and

In his theory, Bourdieu understood the social world as being divided up into a variety of distinct arena or "fields" of practice, each with their own unique set of rules, knowledge, and forms of capital. In some cases, the fields overlap; in this case, there is an overlap of the ICT and financial fields. Each field has its own set of positions and practices, as well as its struggles for a position as people mobilize their

The empirical setting of this research is Malawi. The research uses a case study using a qualitative approach that adopts a descriptive design. Qualitative research addresses the questions of how and why and helps to yield an in-depth understanding of an issue. The descriptive design also "relies on observation as a means of collecting data. It attempts to examine situations in order to establish what is the norm, i.e., what can be predicted to happen again under the same circum-

A case study is an account of an activity, event, or problem that contains a real or hypothetical situation [36]. In this research we use a real-life situation, examining activities surrounding an information system based on integrated financial management systems (IFMIS) in the Ministry of Finance that led to the *cashgate*

not fully implemented because some of these funds are corruptly used.

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

manner that aggravates poverty.

are loans that are payable as debt" [29].

**2.5 Attitudes that aggravate poverty**

**2.4 Poverty and the environment**

not have access to basic education, it would be difficult for them to take advantage of employment and income opportunities created by economic growth. Equally, if educated people do not have sufficient money, they remain poor. Similarly, the discriminated and socially excluded people cannot take advantage of the economic growth [15]. Additionally, if poor people (or indeed all people) are not of good health, they may not be able to contribute to or take advantage of economic growth. Kelles-Viitanen [15] argues that ICT can only contribute to poverty reduction if it is tailored to the needs of the poor and used in the right way and for the right purposes. Kelles-Viitanen [15] adds that ICT is only capable of offering tools and applications but not solutions. "Poverty is the result of economic, political and social processes that interact with each other and frequently reinforce each other". Of interest in this paper is the social processes that, if not properly monitored and evaluated, can provide loopholes where ICT as a tool can be abused and used in a

In Europe, when the Second World War wreaked havoc, the infusion of massive aid by America performed the required recovery [29]. This raises questions of why it is that Africa has never recovered despite years of foreign aid intervention. A number of factors that slow down development and economic growth in Africa are raised; these include excessive expectation of foreign aid [24, 29], which results in passive response to self-help efforts and initiatives; wasting public funds and aid money on white elephant projects; and failure of citizens to question their governments when there is unwarranted public expenditure and wastage. When aid money is misused, it aggravates poverty levels more since most of the "foreign aids

The environment, in this case, refers to our surroundings and the culture therein.

Ngom [30] argues that the African man and woman, in the immense majority of cases, have not yet entered the era of individualism, we remain prisoners and often victims of the family. We remain prisoners in Africa due to the ravages of social parasitism, the rapacity of cousins and those who are called brothers. This is true at all levels of society, power, and social hierarchy and it prompts one to become corrupt as the extended family comes down on your savings and your livelihood. Therefore, "without the omnipresence of the family in Africa, corruption would be the same level as in Europe or Asia, because there are real corrupt everywhere on the planet" [30]. In their research findings, Lyimo-Macha and Kaijage [31] found that household poverty influences the existence of extended families, a thing which makes the one

providing support remain a prisoner. This supports Ngom's arguments.

The way African poverty situation is talked about at political levels gives the impression that poverty on the continent is a permanent situation and not resolvable. This perspective has been accepted because most Africans leaders are happy with the poverty levels in the hope of getting foreign aid. As such, they have refused to make the needed effort required to dispel such an impression. They leave their citizens doing nothing to convince foreign donors that the situation demands external aid as a solution. Narayan [24] argues that poverty is caused by attitude and can only be fought in the presence of strong institutions. On the other hand, the presence of the strong institutions requires a non-corrupt government [6]. Africans fail to make efforts to dispel the poverty impression in the hope of receiving foreign

**88**

aid [24]; when that aid arrives, the programs designed to fight poverty in Africa are not fully implemented because some of these funds are corruptly used.

#### **2.6 Bourdieu's theory and poverty**

Bourdieu theory of society [8] is used in this paper. We found Bourdieu's concepts useful in highlighting the interplay between economic, social, and cultural empowerments within our environments. Bourdieu [8] delineates three fundamental forms of capital: economic, social, and cultural capital. While economic capital is convertible, social capital comprises social connections, while cultural capital can be embodied, objectified, and institutionalized [9]. Bourdieu [8] sees the forms of capital as mutually constitutive in that economic capital affords the time and resources for investment in the development of cultural capital and socioeconomic success. One's social network can be broader, more influential, and more conducive to opportunity and further enhancement of other capital stocks. Further, these forms of capital can be accumulated and transferred from one arena to another [32]. The shift from material to cultural and symbolic forms of capital is to a large extent what hides the causes of inequality [32]. Capital is accumulated labor which, when appropriated, enables one to appropriate social energy in the form of living labor [33]. Capital makes the games of society—the economic game—something other than simple games of chance offering at every moment the possibility of a miracle [33]. Capital also takes time to accumulate [33].

Bourdieu's approach is useful in analyzing power in development and social change processes [32]. Bourdieu sees the power in the lens of *habitus*. Habitus is the way society becomes placed in persons in the form of lasting dispositions [32], the learned set of preferences or dispositions by which a person orients to the social world [34]. It is rooted in family upbringing, created through a social rather than individual process [32], and conditioned by one's position in the social structure. Habitus shapes the parameters of people's sense of agency [9]. In this sense, habitus is created and reproduced unconsciously.

In his theory, Bourdieu understood the social world as being divided up into a variety of distinct arena or "fields" of practice, each with their own unique set of rules, knowledge, and forms of capital. In some cases, the fields overlap; in this case, there is an overlap of the ICT and financial fields. Each field has its own set of positions and practices, as well as its struggles for a position as people mobilize their capital within a particular social domain [33].

#### **3. Methodology**

The empirical setting of this research is Malawi. The research uses a case study using a qualitative approach that adopts a descriptive design. Qualitative research addresses the questions of how and why and helps to yield an in-depth understanding of an issue. The descriptive design also "relies on observation as a means of collecting data. It attempts to examine situations in order to establish what is the norm, i.e., what can be predicted to happen again under the same circumstances" ([35], p. 9).

A case study is an account of an activity, event, or problem that contains a real or hypothetical situation [36]. In this research we use a real-life situation, examining activities surrounding an information system based on integrated financial management systems (IFMIS) in the Ministry of Finance that led to the *cashgate* scandal.

This study combined observation, document analysis, literature study, and reflective methods. The combined methods were particularly useful for triangulation across different data sources. In case study research, Hartley [37] suggests that analysis is like a detective work, which uses different techniques, and therefore it is imperative for a researcher to sift evidence in order to build inferences about events and why the events happened in some circumstances. Observation is important as a method because a qualitative study does not merely rely on asking questions but largely on observation which: involves watching and recording what people say and do…. as it is impossible to record everything, this process is inevitably selective and relies heavily on the researcher to act as the research instrument and document the world he or she observes ([38], p. 183).

In the case used in this paper, observation was achieved by following the different events that unfolded over time as a result of the *cashgate* scandal, how the issue was brought into the open, different modes used to communicate the *cashgate* scandal to the public, the amounts involved, the verdicts given, and comments and opinions from the public.

Document analysis involves interpreting documents to give them a voice and meaning [39] based on the study parameters. Literature study forms a theoretical framework and a knowledge base in poverty dimensions and causes. The literature search was critical as a way of understanding what other people have done and written related to this research and assess where it will fit [25]. Document analysis involved a range of documentation including *cashgate* scandal reports and newspapers (both online and printed).

Literature review, on the other hand, was conducted throughout the study period. In the early stage, an extensive literature search was performed with different purposes: first, to get a good understanding of poverty dimensions and identify factors that have caused it and, second, to identify how ICTs reduce or aggravate poverty in different settings. The literature review has acted as guidance throughout the study, particularly the analysis and discussion stage.

Reflective methods included situations where issues which were observed, read, and heard prior to the study commencement were reflected upon; and in some cases, they helped to make sense of the current insights from observations and document analysis.

#### **4. Case**

While ICT is an avenue to cost cutting and having more efficient operations [40], others view it as an avenue for cutting corners and conducting cynical operations as a way of gaining riches. Below we detail how the integrated financial management system (IFMIS) was used to siphon billions of money in Malawi, leading to massive corruption in what was termed the *cashgate* scandal.

#### **4.1 Context and IFMIS background**

Malawi is one of the low-income economies in sub-Saharan Africa with over 90% of the population living on less than US\$2 a day [41]. Malawi depends on foreign aid in almost all sectors, with 40% of the national budget coming from foreign aid. Despite this aid dependency, the country experienced rapid growth between 2004 and 2010 when the economy grew at an average of 7% [41]. Another area where Malawi has benefited from donor support is the implementation of IFMIS.

IFMIS was acquired and implemented as one of the best practices in the Malawi public financial sector. This whole process started in 1985 when the government

**91**

*Poverty by Design: The Role of ICT*

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86280*

decided to change the budget preparation and presentation system, by defining programs for each ministry and showing the budget by those specific programs [42]. An assessment that took place in 1993 by the World Bank highlighted weaknesses in the Malawi Government's budgeting system. The budget lacked clarity on what the government expected to achieve in each ministry, and the overall government objectives were silent [42]. The result of the assessment was the introduction of a methodology for the Medium-Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) as a central tool for public expenditure management in the budget *process*. MTEF was introduced in 1995 [43]. By 1999, it was clear that the MTEF had not transformed the budget [43]. In parallel, with the introduction of MTEF, the Malawi Government with funding from the World Bank embarked on a project to computerize accounting and financial processes. This led to the implementation of Phase 1 of IFMIS, whose pilot was run in 2001 [44]. Phase 1 of IFMIS encountered implementation challenges [43, 44] which led the government to adopt an Epicor-based IFMIS in 2005 and a rollout of the system in 2006. Specifically, Soft Tech Consulting Limited (Soft Tech), an Epicor limited software solutions technology partner, developed the new version of IFMIS [7] and customized it to meet Malawi's specific requirements across the 50 ministries and government entities. The objectives of implementing IFMIS were to (i) improve and strengthen public expenditure management and (ii) enable government to provide timely and reliable budget having integrated all accounting modules including the budget

module [43]. An extract from the Baker Tilly Report [7] reads:

*before the cheques are processed."*

*"IFMIS generates payments to suppliers entered onto the system. In turn, cheques are raised which are then printed on Reserve Bank of Malawi (RBM) cheques. This function is currently centralized at the Accountant General's Department. All of the payment vouchers, less the supporting documents from the various Ministries, are manually brought to the Accountant General's Department for verification* 

Beyond technical and implementation challenges, it was envisaged that weak political commitment also affected the progress of IFMIS implementation, especially in cases where individual incentives undermined the efforts to promote sound financial management [44]. With the introduction of an Epicor-based IFMIS, the government decided to streamline its payment system from a decentralized to a central payment system (CPS) [44]. Following the introduction of a central payment system, the theft and fraudulent practices were reported to have been minimized. A recommendation was passed to streamline bank accounts to a single treasury payment account. Further, a single account in the Reserve Bank of Malawi was made as a way of reinforcing financial and fiscal discipline [43]. In September 2013, the discovery of massive looting of billions of local currency by officials at the Capitol

Audit reports done after massive looting was reported revealed internal control

It all started when one of the accounts assistants in one of the ministries "was found with huge amounts of money not consistent with his monthly income" [45]. This was later compounded with the shooting of the then budget director in the

failures, with evidence that a significant number of transactions in IFMIS had been deleted [7]; this led to what was named the *cashgate* scandal. However, not all *cashgate* transactions were through IFMIS. The *cashgate* transactions through IFMIS amounted to 6,096,490,705 Malawi Kwacha, 45% of the total *cashgate* bill [7]. In

Hill came into the open. The Capitol Hill is the seat of the government.

this case, we focus on money looted through IFMIS.

**4.2 IFMIS and the** *cashgate* **scandal**

#### *Poverty by Design: The Role of ICT DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86280*

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

world he or she observes ([38], p. 183).

opinions from the public.

pers (both online and printed).

document analysis.

**4. Case**

This study combined observation, document analysis, literature study, and reflective methods. The combined methods were particularly useful for triangulation across different data sources. In case study research, Hartley [37] suggests that analysis is like a detective work, which uses different techniques, and therefore it is imperative for a researcher to sift evidence in order to build inferences about events and why the events happened in some circumstances. Observation is important as a method because a qualitative study does not merely rely on asking questions but largely on observation which: involves watching and recording what people say and do…. as it is impossible to record everything, this process is inevitably selective and relies heavily on the researcher to act as the research instrument and document the

In the case used in this paper, observation was achieved by following the different events that unfolded over time as a result of the *cashgate* scandal, how the issue was brought into the open, different modes used to communicate the *cashgate* scandal to the public, the amounts involved, the verdicts given, and comments and

Document analysis involves interpreting documents to give them a voice and meaning [39] based on the study parameters. Literature study forms a theoretical framework and a knowledge base in poverty dimensions and causes. The literature search was critical as a way of understanding what other people have done and written related to this research and assess where it will fit [25]. Document analysis involved a range of documentation including *cashgate* scandal reports and newspa-

Literature review, on the other hand, was conducted throughout the study period. In the early stage, an extensive literature search was performed with different purposes: first, to get a good understanding of poverty dimensions and identify factors that have caused it and, second, to identify how ICTs reduce or aggravate poverty in different settings. The literature review has acted as guidance throughout

Reflective methods included situations where issues which were observed, read,

and heard prior to the study commencement were reflected upon; and in some cases, they helped to make sense of the current insights from observations and

While ICT is an avenue to cost cutting and having more efficient operations [40], others view it as an avenue for cutting corners and conducting cynical operations as a way of gaining riches. Below we detail how the integrated financial management system (IFMIS) was used to siphon billions of money in Malawi, leading to

Malawi is one of the low-income economies in sub-Saharan Africa with over 90% of the population living on less than US\$2 a day [41]. Malawi depends on foreign aid in almost all sectors, with 40% of the national budget coming from foreign aid. Despite this aid dependency, the country experienced rapid growth between 2004 and 2010 when the economy grew at an average of 7% [41]. Another area where Malawi has benefited from donor support is the implementation of IFMIS. IFMIS was acquired and implemented as one of the best practices in the Malawi public financial sector. This whole process started in 1985 when the government

the study, particularly the analysis and discussion stage.

massive corruption in what was termed the *cashgate* scandal.

**4.1 Context and IFMIS background**

**90**

decided to change the budget preparation and presentation system, by defining programs for each ministry and showing the budget by those specific programs [42]. An assessment that took place in 1993 by the World Bank highlighted weaknesses in the Malawi Government's budgeting system. The budget lacked clarity on what the government expected to achieve in each ministry, and the overall government objectives were silent [42]. The result of the assessment was the introduction of a methodology for the Medium-Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) as a central tool for public expenditure management in the budget *process*. MTEF was introduced in 1995 [43]. By 1999, it was clear that the MTEF had not transformed the budget [43]. In parallel, with the introduction of MTEF, the Malawi Government with funding from the World Bank embarked on a project to computerize accounting and financial processes. This led to the implementation of Phase 1 of IFMIS, whose pilot was run in 2001 [44]. Phase 1 of IFMIS encountered implementation challenges [43, 44] which led the government to adopt an Epicor-based IFMIS in 2005 and a rollout of the system in 2006. Specifically, Soft Tech Consulting Limited (Soft Tech), an Epicor limited software solutions technology partner, developed the new version of IFMIS [7] and customized it to meet Malawi's specific requirements across the 50 ministries and government entities.

The objectives of implementing IFMIS were to (i) improve and strengthen public expenditure management and (ii) enable government to provide timely and reliable budget having integrated all accounting modules including the budget module [43]. An extract from the Baker Tilly Report [7] reads:

*"IFMIS generates payments to suppliers entered onto the system. In turn, cheques are raised which are then printed on Reserve Bank of Malawi (RBM) cheques. This function is currently centralized at the Accountant General's Department. All of the payment vouchers, less the supporting documents from the various Ministries, are manually brought to the Accountant General's Department for verification before the cheques are processed."*

Beyond technical and implementation challenges, it was envisaged that weak political commitment also affected the progress of IFMIS implementation, especially in cases where individual incentives undermined the efforts to promote sound financial management [44]. With the introduction of an Epicor-based IFMIS, the government decided to streamline its payment system from a decentralized to a central payment system (CPS) [44]. Following the introduction of a central payment system, the theft and fraudulent practices were reported to have been minimized. A recommendation was passed to streamline bank accounts to a single treasury payment account. Further, a single account in the Reserve Bank of Malawi was made as a way of reinforcing financial and fiscal discipline [43]. In September 2013, the discovery of massive looting of billions of local currency by officials at the Capitol Hill came into the open. The Capitol Hill is the seat of the government.

Audit reports done after massive looting was reported revealed internal control failures, with evidence that a significant number of transactions in IFMIS had been deleted [7]; this led to what was named the *cashgate* scandal. However, not all *cashgate* transactions were through IFMIS. The *cashgate* transactions through IFMIS amounted to 6,096,490,705 Malawi Kwacha, 45% of the total *cashgate* bill [7]. In this case, we focus on money looted through IFMIS.

#### **4.2 IFMIS and the** *cashgate* **scandal**

It all started when one of the accounts assistants in one of the ministries "was found with huge amounts of money not consistent with his monthly income" [45]. This was later compounded with the shooting of the then budget director in the

Ministry of Finance, on Friday, September 13, 2013 [45, 46]. In the days that followed, several civil servants were found with huge sums of money (in their homes, their vehicles, and some their banks) but lacking proper documentation on how the money was acquired [45]. The question is how did this happen? An initial inquiry conducted by the National Audit Office (Malawi) reported that public officials had stolen funds through making payments without supporting documentation, making payments to ghost workers and suppliers, diverting funds from the original use, and simply appropriating money or material resources without any trace of recording [47]. Of interest is the fact that the officials blamed the integrated financial management information system (IFMIS) [45] although the same IFMIS was reported to be performing well in other countries. The Malawi Government has been losing billions of Kwacha, and the Ministry of Finance blamed the IFMIS for lacking controls, a thing that led to the suspension of the IFMIS. The looting led to donors suspending aid to Malawi. Although IFMIS was blamed for the looting, the same IFMIS was considered as the very tool that enabled investigators to trace those who illegally encashed large sums of money through bank checks. "Thanks to the IT-System used—IFMIS—we seem to be able to trace who and where people took money. So please: Do not blame a computer for corruption—that would be a distraction from the real issue. It's some criminal elements who are committing fraud." [48]. This was true as computerized systems have audit trails that reveal suspicious activities. Properly configured IFMIS systems provide alerts, use biometrics, and have segregation of IT functions [49].

A forensic audit that was conducted on the system by a UK-based firm, Baker Tilly, revealed that poor practices were at play where IFMIS transactions could be deleted and the deletion was not captured by an audit trail. IFMIS was found to have had a weak password protection, a thing that enabled past transactions to be edited or simply deleted, payments could be processed without requiring any authorizations, and there was lack of appropriate feedback mechanisms which meant that large withdrawals from bank accounts were not flagged and reported [47]. Based on an unannounced ad hoc IT security audit, the Baker Tilly report [7] states that (i) the firewall configuration indicated that the firewall settings had been changed to permit any outside connection, (ii) the password controls had been disabled, and (iii) the connections to the IFMIS servers, which should have been routed through the network firewall, had bypassed the firewall. All the three anomalies found were through ICTs. It was also reported that it was more of how the ICT (in this case IFMIS) was used. There were situations where the one with the right to access the system would actually give his/her password to subordinates.

Both formal investigations and anecdotal evidence revealed that the cashgate beneficiaries used the money for lavish spending in posh areas outside Malawi—areas such as Sandton in South Africa; some of the beneficiaries used the funds to build houses. The anomalies represent a fundamental weakening of the internal control framework. This matter is of particular concern as the IFMIS implementation project involved high levels of funding [7]. More recent estimates suggest that the theft of government money had been going on since at least 2009 and that more than \$280 million might have been stolen [50]. Investigations and criminal trials have been launched; since then, over 70 individuals (including high-level civil servants, private contractors, and politicians) have been charged [51]. Over a dozen people have so far been sentenced, while many cases are ongoing. The tried cases are just a fraction of the hundred people under investigation; most notable trial being the one against Paul Mphwiyo and his 17 co-accused [50]. However, it was noted that the trials have been dragging on for months with frequent adjournments. A number of factors have been alluded to including the limited experience that Malawi's legal system has with cases of money laundering and grand corruption; the scale of cashgate scandal and limited

**93**

**5. Discussion**

**5.1 The IFMIS field**

*Poverty by Design: The Role of ICT*

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86280*

resources available; the fact that Malawi's judges are known for going to great lengths to protect the trial rights of the accused, even in the face of the defense's efforts to slow down trials in the hope they will eventually fizzle out; and the frequent frictions between the police, the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB), and the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), as cooperation between the three agencies has been characterized by rivalry, mistrust, and miscommunication [50]. Those who had already gone

While a central element to the cashgate scandal was the manipulation of IFMIS that was supposed to help control spending, this was not the case. For example, the accounts of the tourism ministry or the cabinet office were hacked into, and the hackers found a budget allocation for paper clips that generated bogus payment orders until the allowance was exhausted [52]. A follow-up revealed that a check was then raised and paid into the bank account of a dormant company used solely for money laundering. Money was cashed, and the transaction was then erased from the accounts, so the fraud could be repeated [52]. According to the Baker Tilly report, a number of anomalies were noted: no one checked whether any goods had been delivered, basic filing was not applied, checks were left in printers overnight and made out in corridors rather than secure offices, and payment orders for large sums were honored by the central bank even if they had only two of the three required signatures. In one instance high-value checks with consecutive serial numbers for exact sums were cashed on the same day [52]. Another dimension concerning checks is where once the checks have been issued by the Reserve Bank of Malawi; ICTs (computers) within the banks are used to transfer money into other accounts as a way of disguising the direct transactions from IFMIS. This is supported by a newspaper extract which reads "Malawi Democrat has information that at FDH Bank Mpoola is using the CEO to transfer money into an account belonging

through trials were charged sentences ranging between 3 and 11 years [50].

to his wife. At NBS he is using a girlfriend's accounts" [53].

In his theory, Bourdieu understood the social world as being divided up into fields of practice. This research is positioned in the field of practice of ICT and financial. The practice of ICT comes about due to the fact that IFMIS is an information system used in the Ministry of Finance, whereas the financial practice comes in due to the nature of transactions that IFMIS deals with. The case above has described the set of practices and struggles for a position within the financial field. These include technical and implementation challenges and weak political commitment, all of which affected the progress of IFMIS implementation. Within the practice of ICT, the ICT field also cites its own challenges which included the changed firewall settings in the configuration-disabled password control connections to the IFMIS servers bypassing the firewall. The challenges from both fields compromised the IFMIS. This emphasizes Habito's [21] concern of whose lives is the compromised ICTs improving. Clearly, this benefitted the few who capitalized this situation to siphon government funds. Dutta et al. also argued that ICTs have opened up new digital divides since the opportunities offered contribute to a non-inclusive type of growth. In the case of IFMIS, only a privileged few had a chance to access the system for their own benefit, ending up depleting government funds. This also emphasizes Raji et al.'s [20] point that poor attitude of the citizenry can cause poverty. Here we see a situation where the public funds are siphoned in this field leading to *cashgate* scandal; and as stressed by Owusu-Sekyere [25], this causes poverty. The loss of

#### *Poverty by Design: The Role of ICT DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86280*

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

have segregation of IT functions [49].

Ministry of Finance, on Friday, September 13, 2013 [45, 46]. In the days that followed, several civil servants were found with huge sums of money (in their homes, their vehicles, and some their banks) but lacking proper documentation on how the money was acquired [45]. The question is how did this happen? An initial inquiry conducted by the National Audit Office (Malawi) reported that public officials had stolen funds through making payments without supporting documentation, making payments to ghost workers and suppliers, diverting funds from the original use, and simply appropriating money or material resources without any trace of recording [47]. Of interest is the fact that the officials blamed the integrated financial management information system (IFMIS) [45] although the same IFMIS was reported to be performing well in other countries. The Malawi Government has been losing billions of Kwacha, and the Ministry of Finance blamed the IFMIS for lacking controls, a thing that led to the suspension of the IFMIS. The looting led to donors suspending aid to Malawi. Although IFMIS was blamed for the looting, the same IFMIS was considered as the very tool that enabled investigators to trace those who illegally encashed large sums of money through bank checks. "Thanks to the IT-System used—IFMIS—we seem to be able to trace who and where people took money. So please: Do not blame a computer for corruption—that would be a distraction from the real issue. It's some criminal elements who are committing fraud." [48]. This was true as computerized systems have audit trails that reveal suspicious activities. Properly configured IFMIS systems provide alerts, use biometrics, and

A forensic audit that was conducted on the system by a UK-based firm, Baker Tilly, revealed that poor practices were at play where IFMIS transactions could be deleted and the deletion was not captured by an audit trail. IFMIS was found to have had a weak password protection, a thing that enabled past transactions to be edited or simply deleted, payments could be processed without requiring any authorizations, and there was lack of appropriate feedback mechanisms which meant that large withdrawals from bank accounts were not flagged and reported [47]. Based on an unannounced ad hoc IT security audit, the Baker Tilly report [7] states that (i) the firewall configuration indicated that the firewall settings had been changed to permit any outside connection, (ii) the password controls had been disabled, and (iii) the connections to the IFMIS servers, which should have been routed through the network firewall, had bypassed the firewall. All the three anomalies found were through ICTs. It was also reported that it was more of how the ICT (in this case IFMIS) was used. There were situations where the one with the right to access the

Both formal investigations and anecdotal evidence revealed that the cashgate beneficiaries used the money for lavish spending in posh areas outside Malawi—areas such as Sandton in South Africa; some of the beneficiaries used the funds to build houses. The anomalies represent a fundamental weakening of the internal control framework. This matter is of particular concern as the IFMIS implementation project involved high levels of funding [7]. More recent estimates suggest that the theft of government money had been going on since at least 2009 and that more than \$280 million might have been stolen [50]. Investigations and criminal trials have been launched; since then, over 70 individuals (including high-level civil servants, private contractors, and politicians) have been charged [51]. Over a dozen people have so far been sentenced, while many cases are ongoing. The tried cases are just a fraction of the hundred people under investigation; most notable trial being the one against Paul Mphwiyo and his 17 co-accused [50]. However, it was noted that the trials have been dragging on for months with frequent adjournments. A number of factors have been alluded to including the limited experience that Malawi's legal system has with cases of money laundering and grand corruption; the scale of cashgate scandal and limited

system would actually give his/her password to subordinates.

**92**

resources available; the fact that Malawi's judges are known for going to great lengths to protect the trial rights of the accused, even in the face of the defense's efforts to slow down trials in the hope they will eventually fizzle out; and the frequent frictions between the police, the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB), and the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), as cooperation between the three agencies has been characterized by rivalry, mistrust, and miscommunication [50]. Those who had already gone through trials were charged sentences ranging between 3 and 11 years [50].

While a central element to the cashgate scandal was the manipulation of IFMIS that was supposed to help control spending, this was not the case. For example, the accounts of the tourism ministry or the cabinet office were hacked into, and the hackers found a budget allocation for paper clips that generated bogus payment orders until the allowance was exhausted [52]. A follow-up revealed that a check was then raised and paid into the bank account of a dormant company used solely for money laundering. Money was cashed, and the transaction was then erased from the accounts, so the fraud could be repeated [52]. According to the Baker Tilly report, a number of anomalies were noted: no one checked whether any goods had been delivered, basic filing was not applied, checks were left in printers overnight and made out in corridors rather than secure offices, and payment orders for large sums were honored by the central bank even if they had only two of the three required signatures. In one instance high-value checks with consecutive serial numbers for exact sums were cashed on the same day [52]. Another dimension concerning checks is where once the checks have been issued by the Reserve Bank of Malawi; ICTs (computers) within the banks are used to transfer money into other accounts as a way of disguising the direct transactions from IFMIS. This is supported by a newspaper extract which reads "Malawi Democrat has information that at FDH Bank Mpoola is using the CEO to transfer money into an account belonging to his wife. At NBS he is using a girlfriend's accounts" [53].

#### **5. Discussion**

#### **5.1 The IFMIS field**

In his theory, Bourdieu understood the social world as being divided up into fields of practice. This research is positioned in the field of practice of ICT and financial. The practice of ICT comes about due to the fact that IFMIS is an information system used in the Ministry of Finance, whereas the financial practice comes in due to the nature of transactions that IFMIS deals with. The case above has described the set of practices and struggles for a position within the financial field. These include technical and implementation challenges and weak political commitment, all of which affected the progress of IFMIS implementation. Within the practice of ICT, the ICT field also cites its own challenges which included the changed firewall settings in the configuration-disabled password control connections to the IFMIS servers bypassing the firewall. The challenges from both fields compromised the IFMIS. This emphasizes Habito's [21] concern of whose lives is the compromised ICTs improving. Clearly, this benefitted the few who capitalized this situation to siphon government funds. Dutta et al. also argued that ICTs have opened up new digital divides since the opportunities offered contribute to a non-inclusive type of growth. In the case of IFMIS, only a privileged few had a chance to access the system for their own benefit, ending up depleting government funds. This also emphasizes Raji et al.'s [20] point that poor attitude of the citizenry can cause poverty. Here we see a situation where the public funds are siphoned in this field leading to *cashgate* scandal; and as stressed by Owusu-Sekyere [25], this causes poverty. The loss of

funds through these weak infrastructures in the field of ICT also lowers the GDP, and low GDP is one of such factors cited as causing poverty [26].

#### **5.2 The interplay of economic, social, and cultural capital**

The three Bourdieu's fundamental forms of capital (economic, social, and cultural) fit with the study findings and the behavior patterns that followed by the cashgate beneficiaries. The cashgate beneficiaries were found with huge sums of money siphoned through IFMIS loopholes. Bourdieu [34] argues that such economic capital is convertible. The cashgate beneficiaries had a change in their lifestyle, converting the economic capital to social capital and building their social connections as friends would be attracted with the money and extravagant spending. Slowly the looting became institutionalized as it went on for some time, turning now into cultural capital. This emphasizes Bourdieu's [8] point that the forms of capital are mutually constitutive in that economic capital affords the time and resources for investment in the development of cultural capital and socioeconomic success. Navarro [32] highlights that these forms of capital can be accumulated and transferred from one arena to another and the cashgate beneficiaries were reported to shift their stolen money to outside countries, buying and building houses. Capital is accumulated labor which, when appropriated, enables one to appropriate social energy in the form of living labor and takes time to accumulate [33]. However, the cashgate beneficiaries had an easy way and never took long to accumulate wealth and drove around town with a lot of cash in their car boots. Some looters invested their economic capital into building houses, most of which were abandoned once the looting was discovered. This money was never invested in growth projects unlike in postwar Europe.

#### **5.3 The habitus**

Navarro [32] argues that habitus is rooted in family upbringing, created through a social, rather than individual process, and conditioned by one's position in the social structure, and Edgerton and Roberts [9] stress that habitus is created and reproduced unconsciously. On the other hand, Bourdieu cautions us to be mindful that all practices, and their meanings, are constantly socially created and re-created through space and time. In this case, we see a situation where habitus is conditioned by one's social position and reproduced unconsciously where, for example, budget allocation for paper clips that generated bogus payment orders was done repeatedly in the Ministry of Tourism until the allowance was exhausted. Bourdieu expands the concept of habitus to problematize the ways in which we engage with our own belief systems since ideas and practices seem unquestionably natural to us. We have seen in the case how bogus transactions were taking place, yet no one checked whether any goods had been delivered or basic filing was not applied. Bourdieu further argues that all aspects of the habitus that help guide our social actions tend to be "commonsense behaviors" because, again, we lose sight of when and how meaning behind our practices is actually created; a good example is where people begin to ignore even the sensitive issues and start leaving checks in printers overnight and payment orders for large sums being honored by the central bank even if with only two of the three required signatures. This makes it almost impossible to achieve objectivity despite believing that we are as our understanding of the world is rooted in the all-encompassing, subjective habitus. One can argue that the central bank practice of cashing checks became a commonsense behavior to the extent of losing sight and not checking and noticing that checks with consecutive serial numbers for exact sums were cashed on the same day.

**95**

*Poverty by Design: The Role of ICT*

**5.4 Attitude and poverty**

government to curb these abuses.

**5.5 ICT as poverty aggravator**

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86280*

Bourdieu sees the power in the lens of *habitus*. This is true with the case as the *cashgate* beneficiaries became very popular with the money they were splashing; they exhibited a common behavior pattern of lavish spending, gaining more power over others. Some gained powers to the extent of deleting transactions from the accounts and IFMIS, so the fraud could be repeated. Just as Navarro [32] argues that Bourdieu's approach is useful in analyzing power in development and social change processes, the case has illustrated how the corrupt practices and power gained thereafter led to social change processes. Civil servants with average salaries suddenly are able to buy or build luxurious houses within a short period of time.

As argued by Narayan [24], poverty is also caused by attitude and can only be fought in the presence of strong institutions, a thing that requires a non-corrupt government [6]. In the case of *cashgate* scandal, attitude played a big role; individuals accessing the funds did not care about the impact the loss would have on society or indeed the government. Further, there were no strong institutions in place to detect the fraud taking place in IFMIS early enough, and this emphasizes Korankye's [6] point. Owusu-Sekyere [25] categorize this type of wastage as wastage done deliberately to siphon state funds unwisely to enrich others. This derails economic growth, although, on its own, economic growth is not enough to reduce poverty. Kelles-Viitanen [15] gives an example of poor people finding it difficult to take advantage of employment and income opportunities created by economic growth if they do not have access to basic education or good health. In the context of the study, the *cashgate* scandal deprived society of money which could otherwise have been used to offer

Although Africans fail to make efforts to dispel the poverty impression in the hope

Some observers contend that computerized systems enable massive and automated

fraud. However, this requires a high degree of sophistication and provides a higher chance of being caught. Computerized systems have audit trails that reveal suspicious activities. Properly configured IFMIS systems provide alerts, use biometrics, and have segregation of IT functions [49]. A forensic audit that was conducted on the system by a UK-based firm, Baker Tilly, revealed that poor practices were at play where IFMIS transactions could be deleted and the deletion was not captured by an audit trail [7]. "The deletion of any accounting entries and any subsequent payment of government funds is not a fault within IFMIS. It stems, instead from the weak application of the controls by the individual users and by staff circumventing the controls designed to

of receiving foreign aid [24, 29], the programs designed to fight poverty in Africa are not fully implemented because the use of these funds is misaligned [29] and in some cases they end up in the hands of corrupt individuals [6]. Raji et al. [20] quoting United Nations report allude to the fact that poverty in one of the African countries specifically [20] is both avoidable and unfortunate, caused not by the poor but created and sustained by the system. This has been confirmed in this study, where billions of Kwachas were looted and misappropriated in the cashgate scandal. The situation at hand could have easily been avoided or mitigated. Korankye [6] further argues that due to poor governance, those in authority have failed to apprehend the corrupt. The arguments presented have been confirmed in the case presented in this research. The attitude of civil society in general also left much to be desired. There were laughter, jokes, and galore, but no indignant anger or genuine pressure for the

basic education or good health to many through budget allocations.

#### *Poverty by Design: The Role of ICT DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86280*

Bourdieu sees the power in the lens of *habitus*. This is true with the case as the *cashgate* beneficiaries became very popular with the money they were splashing; they exhibited a common behavior pattern of lavish spending, gaining more power over others. Some gained powers to the extent of deleting transactions from the accounts and IFMIS, so the fraud could be repeated. Just as Navarro [32] argues that Bourdieu's approach is useful in analyzing power in development and social change processes, the case has illustrated how the corrupt practices and power gained thereafter led to social change processes. Civil servants with average salaries suddenly are able to buy or build luxurious houses within a short period of time.

#### **5.4 Attitude and poverty**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

and low GDP is one of such factors cited as causing poverty [26].

**5.2 The interplay of economic, social, and cultural capital**

funds through these weak infrastructures in the field of ICT also lowers the GDP,

The three Bourdieu's fundamental forms of capital (economic, social, and cultural) fit with the study findings and the behavior patterns that followed by the cashgate beneficiaries. The cashgate beneficiaries were found with huge sums of money siphoned through IFMIS loopholes. Bourdieu [34] argues that such economic capital is convertible. The cashgate beneficiaries had a change in their lifestyle, converting the economic capital to social capital and building their social connections as friends would be attracted with the money and extravagant spending. Slowly the looting became institutionalized as it went on for some time, turning now into cultural capital. This emphasizes Bourdieu's [8] point that the forms of capital are mutually constitutive in that economic capital affords the time and resources for investment in the development of cultural capital and socioeconomic success. Navarro [32] highlights that these forms of capital can be accumulated and transferred from one arena to another and the cashgate beneficiaries were reported to shift their stolen money to outside countries, buying and building houses. Capital is accumulated labor which, when appropriated, enables one to appropriate social energy in the form of living labor and takes time to accumulate [33]. However, the cashgate beneficiaries had an easy way and never took long to accumulate wealth and drove around town with a lot of cash in their car boots. Some looters invested their economic capital into building houses, most of which were abandoned once the looting was discovered. This money was never invested in growth projects

Navarro [32] argues that habitus is rooted in family upbringing, created through a social, rather than individual process, and conditioned by one's position in the social structure, and Edgerton and Roberts [9] stress that habitus is created and reproduced unconsciously. On the other hand, Bourdieu cautions us to be mindful that all practices, and their meanings, are constantly socially created and re-created through space and time. In this case, we see a situation where habitus is conditioned by one's social position and reproduced unconsciously where, for example, budget allocation for paper clips that generated bogus payment orders was done repeatedly in the Ministry of Tourism until the allowance was exhausted. Bourdieu expands the concept of habitus to problematize the ways in which we engage with our own belief systems since ideas and practices seem unquestionably natural to us. We have seen in the case how bogus transactions were taking place, yet no one checked whether any goods had been delivered or basic filing was not applied. Bourdieu further argues that all aspects of the habitus that help guide our social actions tend to be "commonsense behaviors" because, again, we lose sight of when and how meaning behind our practices is actually created; a good example is where people begin to ignore even the sensitive issues and start leaving checks in printers overnight and payment orders for large sums being honored by the central bank even if with only two of the three required signatures. This makes it almost impossible to achieve objectivity despite believing that we are as our understanding of the world is rooted in the all-encompassing, subjective habitus. One can argue that the central bank practice of cashing checks became a commonsense behavior to the extent of losing sight and not checking and noticing that checks with consecutive serial numbers for

**94**

exact sums were cashed on the same day.

unlike in postwar Europe.

**5.3 The habitus**

As argued by Narayan [24], poverty is also caused by attitude and can only be fought in the presence of strong institutions, a thing that requires a non-corrupt government [6]. In the case of *cashgate* scandal, attitude played a big role; individuals accessing the funds did not care about the impact the loss would have on society or indeed the government. Further, there were no strong institutions in place to detect the fraud taking place in IFMIS early enough, and this emphasizes Korankye's [6] point. Owusu-Sekyere [25] categorize this type of wastage as wastage done deliberately to siphon state funds unwisely to enrich others. This derails economic growth, although, on its own, economic growth is not enough to reduce poverty. Kelles-Viitanen [15] gives an example of poor people finding it difficult to take advantage of employment and income opportunities created by economic growth if they do not have access to basic education or good health. In the context of the study, the *cashgate* scandal deprived society of money which could otherwise have been used to offer basic education or good health to many through budget allocations.

Although Africans fail to make efforts to dispel the poverty impression in the hope of receiving foreign aid [24, 29], the programs designed to fight poverty in Africa are not fully implemented because the use of these funds is misaligned [29] and in some cases they end up in the hands of corrupt individuals [6]. Raji et al. [20] quoting United Nations report allude to the fact that poverty in one of the African countries specifically [20] is both avoidable and unfortunate, caused not by the poor but created and sustained by the system. This has been confirmed in this study, where billions of Kwachas were looted and misappropriated in the cashgate scandal. The situation at hand could have easily been avoided or mitigated. Korankye [6] further argues that due to poor governance, those in authority have failed to apprehend the corrupt. The arguments presented have been confirmed in the case presented in this research.

The attitude of civil society in general also left much to be desired. There were laughter, jokes, and galore, but no indignant anger or genuine pressure for the government to curb these abuses.

#### **5.5 ICT as poverty aggravator**

Some observers contend that computerized systems enable massive and automated fraud. However, this requires a high degree of sophistication and provides a higher chance of being caught. Computerized systems have audit trails that reveal suspicious activities. Properly configured IFMIS systems provide alerts, use biometrics, and have segregation of IT functions [49]. A forensic audit that was conducted on the system by a UK-based firm, Baker Tilly, revealed that poor practices were at play where IFMIS transactions could be deleted and the deletion was not captured by an audit trail [7]. "The deletion of any accounting entries and any subsequent payment of government funds is not a fault within IFMIS. It stems, instead from the weak application of the controls by the individual users and by staff circumventing the controls designed to

ensure that the system works effectively e.g., sharing user IDs" [7]. Weak application of controls and sharing user IDs can happen in any system. However, the "deletion of any accounting entries" sounds outside of the capabilities of any commercially produced accounting software. This confirms May et al.'s argument that access to ICT is not a solution to poverty. Here we see a situation where access to ICT has had a negative effect, as Habito [21] puts it, contributing to worsening economic poverty and widening income inequality. The question by May et al. [19] on whether investments in ICT represent a worthwhile option for poor communities is also justified; except in this case, the worry is not on the myriad of other necessities, with high priorities, but on the fact that the investment ended up benefitting only a few who were able to siphon the funds.

#### **6. Conclusion**

Practically, the case emphasizes Korankye's [6] argument that fighting poverty requires a non-corrupt government. Korankye further argues that in Africa, programs designed to fight poverty are not fully implemented because the funds end up in the hands of corrupt individuals, who pocket the majority; this is exactly what happened with the *cashgate* scandal. This created an imbalance in society as only a few benefitted from the public funds meant for the masses leading to more poverty. The fact that the funds were drained due to loopholes in the IFMIS usage, we conclude that there are cases where ICTs aggravate poverty. May et al. [5], argue that "access to ICTs cannot be a solution to poverty in and of itself," and in the same vein; we argue and conclude that ICT on its own cannot directly aggravate poverty but misuse of ICTs can. This confirms Adera et al.'s [10] arguments that "ICTs offer an opportunity, not a panacea" and that a number of prerequisites such as regulatory frameworks, ICT policy, and choice of technologies need to be in place.

Theoretically, we have seen how the three Bourdieu's fundamental forms of capital (economic, social, and cultural) fit with the study findings and the behavior patterns that followed by the *cashgate* beneficiaries. As the *cashgate* beneficiaries change of lifestyle converted the economic capital to social capital, as slowly the looting became institutionalized turning now into cultural capital. In the process, the beneficiaries gained power over others.

#### **Author details**

Chipo Kanjo Chancellor College, University of Malawi, Zomba, Malawi

\*Address all correspondence to: chipo.kanjo@gmail.com

© 2020 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

**97**

*Poverty by Design: The Role of ICT*

[2] Gerster R, Zemmamann S. Information and Communication Technologies (ICTS) and Poverty Reduction in Sub-Saharan Africa. Richterswil, Switzerland: Gerster

Consulting; 2003

**References**

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86280*

[1] Duff A. Impact of ICT on society. In: Lawson J, editor. Information and Communication Technology: Options. Essex: Pearson Education Limited. 2002 Theory and Research in Education.

[10] Adera EO, Waema TM, May J, Mascarenhas O, Diga K. ICT Pathways to Poverty Reduction: Empirical Evidence from East and Southern Africa. Rugby, UK: Practical Action Publishing; 2014

[11] Hamelink CJ. Learning cultural pluralism: Can the "information society" help? In: Cliché D, editor. Cultural Ecology: The Changing Dynamics of Communications. London: International Institute of Communications. 1997. pp. 24-43

[12] Eide EB. Preface in The Global Information Technology Report 2015. 2015. Available from: http://www3. weforum.org/docs/WEF\_Global\_IT\_

[13] Mogotlhwane TM, Talib M, Mokwena M. Role of ICT in reduction of poverty in developing countries: Botswana as an evidence in SADC region. In: Cherifi H, Zain JM, El-Qawasmeh E, Editprs. Digital Information and Communication Technology and Its Applications (DICTAP 2011). Communications in Computer and Information Science. Vol. 167. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer; 2011

[14] Ponelis SR, Holmner MA. ICT in Africa: Enabling a better life for all. Information Technology for Development. 2015;**21**(1):1-11

[15] Kelles-Viitanen A. The Role of ICT in Poverty Reduction. 2003. Available from: https://www.eva.fi/wp-content/ uploads/files/397\_the\_role\_of\_ict.pdf

Economics of Development. Oyo Nigeria: Immaculate-City. Publishers; 2003

[16] Oladokun R. Basic Issues in

[17] Dutta S, Geiger T, Lanvin B. Executive Summary in the Global

Report\_2015.pdf

2014;**12**(2):193-220

[3] Okello G, Adhiambo M, Maritim KO. The role of ICT in economic growth and poverty reduction. International Journal of Arts and Commerce. 2014;**3**(3):35-48

[4] Olatokun WM. Gender and National ICT policy in Africa: Issues, strategies, and policy options. Information Development. 2008;**24**(1):1-26. https://www.researchgate.net/ journal/0266-6669\_blank

[5] May J, Waema TM, Bjastad E. The ICT/poverty nexus in Africa. In: Adera EO, Waema TM, May J, Mascarenhas O, Diga K, editors. ICT Pathways to Poverty Reduction: Empirical Evidence from East and Southern Africa. Rugby, UK: Practical Action Publishing; 2014

[6] Korankye A. Causes of poverty in Africa: A review of literature. American International Journal of Social Science.

[7] Baker Tilly Report. Cashgate Overarching Findings Report to the

[8] Bourdieu P. The forms of capital. In: Halsey AH, Lauder H, Brown P, Wells AM, editors. Education, Culture, and Society. Oxford, UK: Oxford University

2014;**3**(7):147-153

Auditor General. 2014

Press; 1997. pp. 46-58

[9] Edgerton JD, Roberts LW.

Cultural capital or habitus? Bourdieu and beyond in the explanation of enduring educational inequality.

### **References**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

ensure that the system works effectively e.g., sharing user IDs" [7]. Weak application of controls and sharing user IDs can happen in any system. However, the "deletion of any accounting entries" sounds outside of the capabilities of any commercially produced accounting software. This confirms May et al.'s argument that access to ICT is not a solution to poverty. Here we see a situation where access to ICT has had a negative effect, as Habito [21] puts it, contributing to worsening economic poverty and widening income inequality. The question by May et al. [19] on whether investments in ICT represent a worthwhile option for poor communities is also justified; except in this case, the worry is not on the myriad of other necessities, with high priorities, but on the fact that the investment ended up benefitting only a few who were able to siphon the funds.

Practically, the case emphasizes Korankye's [6] argument that fighting poverty requires a non-corrupt government. Korankye further argues that in Africa, programs designed to fight poverty are not fully implemented because the funds end up in the hands of corrupt individuals, who pocket the majority; this is exactly what happened with the *cashgate* scandal. This created an imbalance in society as only a few benefitted from the public funds meant for the masses leading to more poverty. The fact that the funds were drained due to loopholes in the IFMIS usage, we conclude that there are cases where ICTs aggravate poverty. May et al. [5], argue that "access to ICTs cannot be a solution to poverty in and of itself," and in the same vein; we argue and conclude that ICT on its own cannot directly aggravate poverty but misuse of ICTs can. This confirms Adera et al.'s [10] arguments that "ICTs offer an opportunity, not a panacea" and that a number of prerequisites such as regulatory frameworks, ICT policy, and choice of technologies need to be in place. Theoretically, we have seen how the three Bourdieu's fundamental forms of capital (economic, social, and cultural) fit with the study findings and the behavior patterns that followed by the *cashgate* beneficiaries. As the *cashgate* beneficiaries change of lifestyle converted the economic capital to social capital, as slowly the looting became institutionalized turning now into cultural capital. In the process,

© 2020 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,

**96**

**Author details**

Chipo Kanjo

**6. Conclusion**

provided the original work is properly cited.

Chancellor College, University of Malawi, Zomba, Malawi

\*Address all correspondence to: chipo.kanjo@gmail.com

the beneficiaries gained power over others.

[1] Duff A. Impact of ICT on society. In: Lawson J, editor. Information and Communication Technology: Options. Essex: Pearson Education Limited. 2002

[2] Gerster R, Zemmamann S. Information and Communication Technologies (ICTS) and Poverty Reduction in Sub-Saharan Africa. Richterswil, Switzerland: Gerster Consulting; 2003

[3] Okello G, Adhiambo M, Maritim KO. The role of ICT in economic growth and poverty reduction. International Journal of Arts and Commerce. 2014;**3**(3):35-48

[4] Olatokun WM. Gender and National ICT policy in Africa: Issues, strategies, and policy options. Information Development. 2008;**24**(1):1-26. https://www.researchgate.net/ journal/0266-6669\_blank

[5] May J, Waema TM, Bjastad E. The ICT/poverty nexus in Africa. In: Adera EO, Waema TM, May J, Mascarenhas O, Diga K, editors. ICT Pathways to Poverty Reduction: Empirical Evidence from East and Southern Africa. Rugby, UK: Practical Action Publishing; 2014

[6] Korankye A. Causes of poverty in Africa: A review of literature. American International Journal of Social Science. 2014;**3**(7):147-153

[7] Baker Tilly Report. Cashgate Overarching Findings Report to the Auditor General. 2014

[8] Bourdieu P. The forms of capital. In: Halsey AH, Lauder H, Brown P, Wells AM, editors. Education, Culture, and Society. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press; 1997. pp. 46-58

[9] Edgerton JD, Roberts LW. Cultural capital or habitus? Bourdieu and beyond in the explanation of enduring educational inequality.

Theory and Research in Education. 2014;**12**(2):193-220

[10] Adera EO, Waema TM, May J, Mascarenhas O, Diga K. ICT Pathways to Poverty Reduction: Empirical Evidence from East and Southern Africa. Rugby, UK: Practical Action Publishing; 2014

[11] Hamelink CJ. Learning cultural pluralism: Can the "information society" help? In: Cliché D, editor. Cultural Ecology: The Changing Dynamics of Communications. London: International Institute of Communications. 1997. pp. 24-43

[12] Eide EB. Preface in The Global Information Technology Report 2015. 2015. Available from: http://www3. weforum.org/docs/WEF\_Global\_IT\_ Report\_2015.pdf

[13] Mogotlhwane TM, Talib M, Mokwena M. Role of ICT in reduction of poverty in developing countries: Botswana as an evidence in SADC region. In: Cherifi H, Zain JM, El-Qawasmeh E, Editprs. Digital Information and Communication Technology and Its Applications (DICTAP 2011). Communications in Computer and Information Science. Vol. 167. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer; 2011

[14] Ponelis SR, Holmner MA. ICT in Africa: Enabling a better life for all. Information Technology for Development. 2015;**21**(1):1-11

[15] Kelles-Viitanen A. The Role of ICT in Poverty Reduction. 2003. Available from: https://www.eva.fi/wp-content/ uploads/files/397\_the\_role\_of\_ict.pdf

[16] Oladokun R. Basic Issues in Economics of Development. Oyo Nigeria: Immaculate-City. Publishers; 2003

[17] Dutta S, Geiger T, Lanvin B. Executive Summary in the Global Information Technology Report. Vol. 2015. 2015 Available from: http://www3. weforum.org/docs/WEF\_Global\_IT\_ Report\_2015.pdf

[18] Battista AD, Dutta S, Geiger T, Lanvin B. The networked readiness. Index 2015: Taking the pulse of the ICT revolution. In: The Global Information Technology Report 2015; 2015. Available from: http://www3.weforum.org/docs/ WEF\_Global\_IT\_Report\_2015.pdf

[19] May J, Dutton V, Munyakazi L. Information and communication technologies as a pathway from poverty: Evidence from East Africa. In: Adera EO, Waema TM, May J, Mascarenhas O, Diga K, editors. ICT Pathways to Poverty Reduction: Empirical Evidence from East and Southern Africa. Rugby, UK: Practical Action Publishing; 2014

[20] Raji MO, Ayoade OB, Usoro A. The prospects and problems of adopting ICT for poverty eradication in Nigeria. The Electronic Journal on Information Systems in Developing Countries (EJISDC). 2006;**28**(8):1-9

[21] Habito CF. Does Technology Worsen Poverty? Philippine Daily Inquirer. 2017. Available from: http://opinion.inquirer. net/107865/technology-worsenpoverty#ixzz599aeIg3g

[22] Lotter HPP. Are ICTs Prerequisites for the Eradication of Poverty? 2006

[23] Leyshon A, Thrift N. Money/Space: Geographies of Monetary Transformation. London: Routledge; 1997

[24] Narayan D. Poverty is powerlessness and voicelessness. 2000;**37**:18-21

[25] Owusu-Sekyere BN. Is Poverty Made in Africa? 2009. Retrieved from: www.thembosdev.biz

[26] Khuhawar KH, Jiangiu Z, Farkhunda S, Ye Y. Crush the poverty by information and communication

technology. International Journal of Scientific & Technology Research. 2014;**3**(4):250-256

[27] Joshua TB. SCOAN Sunday Live Service Sermon, Nigeria; 2009/2016

[28] UN. The Future We Want. Outcome document of the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development. June 2012. Para 247. 2012. Available from: https:// sustainabledevelopment.un.org/content/ documents/733FutureWeWant.pdf

[29] Sekyere BNO. Is Poverty Made in Africa? 2009. Available from: www. thembosdev.com

[30] Ngom A. Why Is Africa So Rich but So Poor? QUORA. 2018. Available from: https://www.quora.com/ Why-is-Africa-so-rich-but-so-poor

[31] Lyimo-Macha JG, Kaijage JM. The impact of extended family on household poverty in korogwe township. University of Dar es Salaam Journals. 2009;**16**(2)

[32] Navarro Z. In search of cultural interpretation of power. IDS Bulletin. 2006;**37**(6):1-22

[33] Bourdieu P. In: Richardson JG, editor. The Forms of Capital, Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Capital. New York: Greenwood Press; 1986. pp. 241-258

[34] Bourdieu P. Foreword. In: Le Seuer JD, editor. Uncivil War: Intellectuals and Identity Politics During the Decolonization of Algeria. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press; 2002

[35] Walliman N. Research Methods: The Basics. London. New York: Routledge; 2011

[36] Kardos G, Smith CO. On writing engineering cases. In: Proceedings

**99**

*Poverty by Design: The Role of ICT*

2004. pp. 323-333

2009;**9**(2):27-40

Africa. 1999

pp. 2-3

www.U4.no

of ASEE National Conference on Engineering Case Studies. 1979

[38] Mays N, Pope C. Rigour and qualitative research. British Medical

[39] Bowen GA. Document analysis as a qualitative research method. Qualitative Research Journal.

[40] Dutta S, Mia I. The Global Information Technology Report 2010-2011. Transformations 2.0. 10th Anniversary ed. Geneva: World Economic Forum (WEF); 2011

[41] Wroe D. Donors, dependency, and political crisis in Malawi. African Affairs. 2012;**111**(442):135-144

[42] Anipa S, Kaluma F, Muggeridge E. DFID Seminar on Best Practice in Public Expenditure Management: Case Study MTEF in Malawi and Ghana. Consulting

[43] Mnthambala NTIFMIS. A case for Malawi. In: Proceedings of the ICGFM Winter Conference; December 2007.

[44] Chene M. In: Hodess R, editor. The Implementation of Integrated Financial Information Management Systems (IFMIS): U4 Expert Answers. CHR Michelsen Institute: Transparency International; 2009. Available from:

[45] Gondwe G. Malawi Blames IFMIS for Billions in Losses. BIZTech Africa. 2013. Available from: http://www. biztechafrica.com/article/malawiblames-ifmis-billions-losses/7068/

[Accessed: 24 January 2017]

Journal. 1995;**311**:109-112

[37] Hartley J. Case study research. In: Cassell C, Symon G, editors. Essential Guide to Qualitative Research in

Organizational Research. London: Sage;

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86280*

[46] Kayuni SW. Running to stand still: Reflections on the cashgate scandal heist in Malawi. Journal of Money Laundering Control. 2016;**19**(2):169-188

[47] FutureLearn. Understanding Public Financial Management: How Is Your Money Spent? SOAS University of London. n.d. Available from: https:// www.futurelearn.com/courses/ public-financial-management/0/

[48] Woeste P. Germany Ambassador to Malawi Peter Woeste as quoted by Times

[49] Kenya Today. How IFMIS was Used to Steal Billions in Malawi. 2015. Available from: http://www.kenyatoday.com/news [Accessed: 21 January

[50] Anders G. Malawi Faces Toughest, Most High-Profile Trial Yet in Massive Cashgate Scandal, African Arguments Newsletter. 2017. Available from: https:// africanarguments.org/2017/02/08/ malawi-faces-toughest-most-highprofile-trial-yet-in-cashgate-scandal/

[51] Kainja J. Why No-One Cares About Malawi's Biggest Problem. The Nation Online Newspaper. 2018. Retrieved

[52] The Economist. Malawi's Cashgate Scandal: The \$32m Heist. 2014.

Available from: https://www.economist. com/baobab/2014/02/27/the-32m-heist

[53] Talk Afrika News. Available from: http://talk-afrika.blogspot. com/2013/10/mpoola-lutepo-bank-

accounts-frozen-over.html

from: mwnation.com

steps/14718

Media. 2013

2017]

*Poverty by Design: The Role of ICT DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86280*

of ASEE National Conference on Engineering Case Studies. 1979

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

technology. International Journal of Scientific & Technology Research.

[27] Joshua TB. SCOAN Sunday Live Service Sermon, Nigeria; 2009/2016

[29] Sekyere BNO. Is Poverty Made in Africa? 2009. Available from: www.

[30] Ngom A. Why Is Africa So Rich but So Poor? QUORA. 2018. Available from: https://www.quora.com/ Why-is-Africa-so-rich-but-so-poor

[31] Lyimo-Macha JG, Kaijage JM. The impact of extended family on household

[32] Navarro Z. In search of cultural interpretation of power. IDS Bulletin.

[34] Bourdieu P. Foreword. In: Le Seuer JD, editor. Uncivil War: Intellectuals and Identity Politics During the

Decolonization of Algeria. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press;

[35] Walliman N. Research Methods: The Basics. London. New York: Routledge;

[36] Kardos G, Smith CO. On writing engineering cases. In: Proceedings

[33] Bourdieu P. In: Richardson JG, editor. The Forms of Capital, Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Capital. New York: Greenwood Press; 1986. pp. 241-258

poverty in korogwe township. University of Dar es Salaam Journals.

[28] UN. The Future We Want. Outcome document of the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development. June 2012. Para 247. 2012. Available from: https:// sustainabledevelopment.un.org/content/ documents/733FutureWeWant.pdf

2014;**3**(4):250-256

thembosdev.com

2009;**16**(2)

2002

2011

2006;**37**(6):1-22

Information Technology Report. Vol. 2015. 2015 Available from: http://www3. weforum.org/docs/WEF\_Global\_IT\_

[18] Battista AD, Dutta S, Geiger T, Lanvin B. The networked readiness. Index 2015: Taking the pulse of the ICT revolution. In: The Global Information Technology Report 2015; 2015. Available from: http://www3.weforum.org/docs/ WEF\_Global\_IT\_Report\_2015.pdf

[19] May J, Dutton V, Munyakazi L. Information and communication technologies as a pathway from poverty: Evidence from East Africa. In: Adera EO, Waema TM, May J, Mascarenhas O, Diga K, editors. ICT Pathways to Poverty Reduction: Empirical Evidence from East and Southern Africa. Rugby, UK: Practical Action Publishing; 2014

[20] Raji MO, Ayoade OB, Usoro A. The prospects and problems of adopting ICT for poverty eradication in Nigeria. The Electronic Journal on Information Systems in Developing Countries

[21] Habito CF. Does Technology Worsen Poverty? Philippine Daily Inquirer. 2017. Available from: http://opinion.inquirer. net/107865/technology-worsen-

[22] Lotter HPP. Are ICTs Prerequisites for the Eradication of Poverty? 2006

[23] Leyshon A, Thrift N. Money/Space: Geographies of Monetary Transformation.

[24] Narayan D. Poverty is powerlessness

and voicelessness. 2000;**37**:18-21

[26] Khuhawar KH, Jiangiu Z,

[25] Owusu-Sekyere BN. Is Poverty Made in Africa? 2009. Retrieved from:

Farkhunda S, Ye Y. Crush the poverty by information and communication

(EJISDC). 2006;**28**(8):1-9

poverty#ixzz599aeIg3g

London: Routledge; 1997

www.thembosdev.biz

Report\_2015.pdf

**98**

[37] Hartley J. Case study research. In: Cassell C, Symon G, editors. Essential Guide to Qualitative Research in Organizational Research. London: Sage; 2004. pp. 323-333

[38] Mays N, Pope C. Rigour and qualitative research. British Medical Journal. 1995;**311**:109-112

[39] Bowen GA. Document analysis as a qualitative research method. Qualitative Research Journal. 2009;**9**(2):27-40

[40] Dutta S, Mia I. The Global Information Technology Report 2010-2011. Transformations 2.0. 10th Anniversary ed. Geneva: World Economic Forum (WEF); 2011

[41] Wroe D. Donors, dependency, and political crisis in Malawi. African Affairs. 2012;**111**(442):135-144

[42] Anipa S, Kaluma F, Muggeridge E. DFID Seminar on Best Practice in Public Expenditure Management: Case Study MTEF in Malawi and Ghana. Consulting Africa. 1999

[43] Mnthambala NTIFMIS. A case for Malawi. In: Proceedings of the ICGFM Winter Conference; December 2007. pp. 2-3

[44] Chene M. In: Hodess R, editor. The Implementation of Integrated Financial Information Management Systems (IFMIS): U4 Expert Answers. CHR Michelsen Institute: Transparency International; 2009. Available from: www.U4.no

[45] Gondwe G. Malawi Blames IFMIS for Billions in Losses. BIZTech Africa. 2013. Available from: http://www. biztechafrica.com/article/malawiblames-ifmis-billions-losses/7068/ [Accessed: 24 January 2017]

[46] Kayuni SW. Running to stand still: Reflections on the cashgate scandal heist in Malawi. Journal of Money Laundering Control. 2016;**19**(2):169-188

[47] FutureLearn. Understanding Public Financial Management: How Is Your Money Spent? SOAS University of London. n.d. Available from: https:// www.futurelearn.com/courses/ public-financial-management/0/ steps/14718

[48] Woeste P. Germany Ambassador to Malawi Peter Woeste as quoted by Times Media. 2013

[49] Kenya Today. How IFMIS was Used to Steal Billions in Malawi. 2015. Available from: http://www.kenyatoday.com/news [Accessed: 21 January 2017]

[50] Anders G. Malawi Faces Toughest, Most High-Profile Trial Yet in Massive Cashgate Scandal, African Arguments Newsletter. 2017. Available from: https:// africanarguments.org/2017/02/08/ malawi-faces-toughest-most-highprofile-trial-yet-in-cashgate-scandal/

[51] Kainja J. Why No-One Cares About Malawi's Biggest Problem. The Nation Online Newspaper. 2018. Retrieved from: mwnation.com

[52] The Economist. Malawi's Cashgate Scandal: The \$32m Heist. 2014. Available from: https://www.economist. com/baobab/2014/02/27/the-32m-heist

[53] Talk Afrika News. Available from: http://talk-afrika.blogspot. com/2013/10/mpoola-lutepo-bankaccounts-frozen-over.html

**101**

**Chapter 6**

**Abstract**

of corruption stories.

journalism narrative

**1. Introduction**

*Abdelkader Abdelali*

Traditional and Online Journalism

In the modern democracies, journalism exercises an important role in the political process, in controlling and monitoring government activities, and watchdogging political authority from abuse derives controversy in Algeria, which is a case of journalistic situation in an authoritarian regime with a stumbling attempt to democratic transition. In order to trait covering in this case, it can be verified in the journalism narratives, telling story about corruption. The article tries to shed light on some important corruption issues that Algeria has witnessed and demonstrate by using narrative analysis of online journalism and traditional paper journalism as how the media and journalism anti-corruption activities have declined in terms of substance and achievements and how it subjected to re-narrate the official version

**Keywords:** the Algerian press, political corruption, Khalifa Bank case,

Algerian East-West Highway case, the Algerian press law, the arrest of journalists,

The free press has a considerable role in monitoring government activities and on the practices of politicians in democracies. As the fourth estate within society and politics, the press controls over the practices of corruption, but these roles varies across political systems, where the function of the press journalist is varied widely in the authority criticism abilities, the transfer of information and coverage of news. The provisions of public service, in addition to monitoring role through journalist's investigations and the role of exposing political corruption and public affairs through the investigative press, news transmission, info's circulation, reporting proceeding trials, and public opinion interaction with political issues are all tasks of the free journalism. But in the other side, the press can produce biased press campaigns and propaganda and the propagation of rumor and false news by the so-called yellow press have reverse effect on corruption uncovering in journalism. However, the task has become more complicated by the advent of electronic journalism and social networking, which has made the function of journalism as a very

complex issue in the transmission of news and the fight against corruption.

and Corruption Investigation

Issues: The Case of Algeria

#### **Chapter 6**

## Traditional and Online Journalism and Corruption Investigation Issues: The Case of Algeria

*Abdelkader Abdelali*

#### **Abstract**

In the modern democracies, journalism exercises an important role in the political process, in controlling and monitoring government activities, and watchdogging political authority from abuse derives controversy in Algeria, which is a case of journalistic situation in an authoritarian regime with a stumbling attempt to democratic transition. In order to trait covering in this case, it can be verified in the journalism narratives, telling story about corruption. The article tries to shed light on some important corruption issues that Algeria has witnessed and demonstrate by using narrative analysis of online journalism and traditional paper journalism as how the media and journalism anti-corruption activities have declined in terms of substance and achievements and how it subjected to re-narrate the official version of corruption stories.

**Keywords:** the Algerian press, political corruption, Khalifa Bank case, Algerian East-West Highway case, the Algerian press law, the arrest of journalists, journalism narrative

#### **1. Introduction**

The free press has a considerable role in monitoring government activities and on the practices of politicians in democracies. As the fourth estate within society and politics, the press controls over the practices of corruption, but these roles varies across political systems, where the function of the press journalist is varied widely in the authority criticism abilities, the transfer of information and coverage of news. The provisions of public service, in addition to monitoring role through journalist's investigations and the role of exposing political corruption and public affairs through the investigative press, news transmission, info's circulation, reporting proceeding trials, and public opinion interaction with political issues are all tasks of the free journalism. But in the other side, the press can produce biased press campaigns and propaganda and the propagation of rumor and false news by the so-called yellow press have reverse effect on corruption uncovering in journalism. However, the task has become more complicated by the advent of electronic journalism and social networking, which has made the function of journalism as a very complex issue in the transmission of news and the fight against corruption.

#### **1.1 Research questions**

The principle question arises on the status of the press and its tasks in detecting corruption cases, under transitional or quasi-democratic political systems, such as the case of Algeria. We can ask the following questions about is the nature of the narrative, about issues of corruption, produced by the press and journalism? Is its role just limited to transferring what the political authority or incumbent power is promoting from narrative? Does the advent of electronic journalism represent a quantum leap in the audacity to deal with corruption issues? Those questions can shed light on some other questions and assumptions about constraints that reconfigure the journalism discourse on corruption in the public sphere. And about the manner of transferring and reproducing corruption's narratives that supports what the authorities want to and what not to diffuse, the kind of journalistic mission toward corruption cases, despite the introduction of new electronic media and social networks, this situation may represent a new difference in journalistic work, about anti-corruption issues, and if the electronic press has been able to penetrate the barrier of censorship and prohibition in detecting corrupt practices or it has not.

This chapter attempts to address this issue through four sections. Theoretical and field studies on journalism and the literature about the ability to detect corruption and the journalistic narrative about corruption. Section 3 deals with the reality of journalism and journalistic work in Algeria, in terms of restrictions, opportunities, and the status of press freedom. Section 4 deals with three cases of corruption that occurred in Algeria, the quarter dealing with: how journalism and journalistic work have been dealt with and what the nature of the journalistic narrative produced. Was it convincing to the public? And if there is a significant difference between a traditional journalistic narrative and a new electronic press narrative.

#### **1.2 Method**

This research included a sample of newspaper articles, from the most famous Algerian newspapers, electronic and traditional one, and the most widespread and readable in the country; this research treated 35 different articles for 8 daily newspapers; 4 were issued in Arabic (Elkhabar, Echourouk, Elhiwar, and Annasr), and two issued in French (Al Watan and La Liberte). All of these newspapers have their electronic versions, in addition to two pure electronic newspapers: TSA and the Algerie Press. In their coverage of three known corruption cases, the East-West highway, Khalifa Bank case, and the Sonatrach 1 and 2 cases, all these cases are for large-scale corruption scandal.

This study adopted the method of qualitative narrative research, due to its usefulness to deepen analysis, and it can give further insight on the context in which the press operates and how this is reflected in the narration content which provides and limits what it reveals as narration products. This is by using narrative analysis, based on the latent content analyses [1]. The analysis framework in this chapter aims to uncover the impact of the institutional and political context on the structure of the corruption narratives reflected in journalistic articles and allows exploration of important elements that can reveal the reality and context in which the press operates. As a kind of analysis of the discourse, it leads to the identification of the method of reproduction and exercise of power through the media field, especially in important areas of political corruption.

In this topic, the research tries to construct an objective analysis, using the thematic analysis [2, 3], which focuses on the basic characteristics of the subject and its textual manifestations. The analysis include five principal analysis categories, and they all belong to "what was said" or what was "narrated" about corruption:

**103**

*Traditional and Online Journalism and Corruption Investigation Issues: The Case of Algeria*

the category of fighting corruption, who is the accused, what are the charges, what are the concepts involved, and what is the analysis or interpretation given to events. The study was adopted by the subject module (verbatim text) [2], to identify and

Many reports and researches have discussed the role of journalism in the fight against corruption, through several cases across the world, but it is still limited to focus only on promoting a set of liberal ideals and relate it to what the press should be. Because the press has not been affected by corruption, and supposed not to be affected, given the motivation of competition and the search for truth, it should not be covered by corruption when it enjoys a level of independence, pluralism, and freedom. It will be an impartial actor in confronting and exposing corrupt practices; since the press is the fourth estate, it can act as a detective and watchdog on the public interest, not just as passive recorder of events [4–6]. Some studies, however, lack comprehensive perspectives and theoretical depth and did not address the test of clear hypotheses in this topic. Even studies of corruption as a phenomenon has its specific influence on the political process and political change; the press has been seen as a party that does not play a central role in the fight against corruption but is a means of communication process. There are big literatures that used general theories of communication [7–10] and tried to deal with questions, such as who owns the press corporations, and according to which editorial line does

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85925*

**2. Journalistic task and confronting corruption**

the press work on? What interests do the press advocate or defend?

There have been lots of studies, in spotlight of journalism and press freedom in the liberal sense, focusing on the context and conditions that enhance the role of journalism, especially the practice of journalistic investigation, in democratic and liberal states. In fact, the ability to investigate and control the press is linked essentially and basically on the conditions of freedom, the independence of the judiciary, and legal restrictions to arbitrary government actions [11, 12]. The fact that freedom of the press is one of the prerequisite for the right to information, the right to seek information and the right to disseminate information. Within the limits that do not harm the legitimate interests of the democratic political system, and that the media is one of the important tools or actors in fight against corruption, which requires the collective participation of the official and unofficial bodies [13]. However, some studies, which have a critical trend in media freedom, are beginning to pay attention to the conditions of the political economy and the context of special interests and market imperatives, which mortgage and constrain the work of a free and private press. The press reflects the strong and influential interests of society. It cannot go beyond some red lines in investigations and investigations about corruption, where press freedom is just a mere theory and an ideal [14–16]. Many critical journalism scholars from democratic countries, especially the United States of America, point out that the press is under the authority of influential elites who make public opinion, manipulating minds in the words of Herbert Schiller [17–19]. However, effectively, the role of the press cannot be neglected in uncovering corruption throughout the globe. Many corruption-related issues have been leaked to the media and have been exposed to the media and have led to political changes such as the fall of Governments. The Watergate scandal led to the downfall of the Nixon presidency in the United States; similar incidents are found in European cases, and in the rest of the world's democracies, and even in non-democratic states within permissible limits. There was an optimistic view that freedom given to the press by political authority and society can provide many corruption-related

monitor content.

the category of fighting corruption, who is the accused, what are the charges, what are the concepts involved, and what is the analysis or interpretation given to events. The study was adopted by the subject module (verbatim text) [2], to identify and monitor content.

#### **2. Journalistic task and confronting corruption**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

The principle question arises on the status of the press and its tasks in detecting corruption cases, under transitional or quasi-democratic political systems, such as the case of Algeria. We can ask the following questions about is the nature of the narrative, about issues of corruption, produced by the press and journalism? Is its role just limited to transferring what the political authority or incumbent power is promoting from narrative? Does the advent of electronic journalism represent a quantum leap in the audacity to deal with corruption issues? Those questions can shed light on some other questions and assumptions about constraints that reconfigure the journalism discourse on corruption in the public sphere. And about the manner of transferring and reproducing corruption's narratives that supports what the authorities want to and what not to diffuse, the kind of journalistic mission toward corruption cases, despite the introduction of new electronic media and social networks, this situation may represent a new difference in journalistic work, about anti-corruption issues, and if the electronic press has been able to penetrate the barrier of censorship and prohibition in detecting corrupt practices or it has not. This chapter attempts to address this issue through four sections. Theoretical and field studies on journalism and the literature about the ability to detect corruption and the journalistic narrative about corruption. Section 3 deals with the reality of journalism and journalistic work in Algeria, in terms of restrictions, opportunities, and the status of press freedom. Section 4 deals with three cases of corruption that occurred in Algeria, the quarter dealing with: how journalism and journalistic work have been dealt with and what the nature of the journalistic narrative produced. Was it convincing to the public? And if there is a significant difference between a traditional journalistic narrative and a new electronic press narrative.

This research included a sample of newspaper articles, from the most famous Algerian newspapers, electronic and traditional one, and the most widespread and readable in the country; this research treated 35 different articles for 8 daily newspapers; 4 were issued in Arabic (Elkhabar, Echourouk, Elhiwar, and Annasr), and two issued in French (Al Watan and La Liberte). All of these newspapers have their electronic versions, in addition to two pure electronic newspapers: TSA and the Algerie Press. In their coverage of three known corruption cases, the East-West highway, Khalifa Bank case, and the Sonatrach 1 and 2 cases, all these cases are for

This study adopted the method of qualitative narrative research, due to its usefulness to deepen analysis, and it can give further insight on the context in which the press operates and how this is reflected in the narration content which provides and limits what it reveals as narration products. This is by using narrative analysis, based on the latent content analyses [1]. The analysis framework in this chapter aims to uncover the impact of the institutional and political context on the structure of the corruption narratives reflected in journalistic articles and allows exploration of important elements that can reveal the reality and context in which the press operates. As a kind of analysis of the discourse, it leads to the identification of the method of reproduction and exercise of power through the media field, especially

In this topic, the research tries to construct an objective analysis, using the thematic analysis [2, 3], which focuses on the basic characteristics of the subject and its textual manifestations. The analysis include five principal analysis categories, and they all belong to "what was said" or what was "narrated" about corruption:

**1.1 Research questions**

**102**

**1.2 Method**

large-scale corruption scandal.

in important areas of political corruption.

Many reports and researches have discussed the role of journalism in the fight against corruption, through several cases across the world, but it is still limited to focus only on promoting a set of liberal ideals and relate it to what the press should be. Because the press has not been affected by corruption, and supposed not to be affected, given the motivation of competition and the search for truth, it should not be covered by corruption when it enjoys a level of independence, pluralism, and freedom. It will be an impartial actor in confronting and exposing corrupt practices; since the press is the fourth estate, it can act as a detective and watchdog on the public interest, not just as passive recorder of events [4–6]. Some studies, however, lack comprehensive perspectives and theoretical depth and did not address the test of clear hypotheses in this topic. Even studies of corruption as a phenomenon has its specific influence on the political process and political change; the press has been seen as a party that does not play a central role in the fight against corruption but is a means of communication process. There are big literatures that used general theories of communication [7–10] and tried to deal with questions, such as who owns the press corporations, and according to which editorial line does the press work on? What interests do the press advocate or defend?

There have been lots of studies, in spotlight of journalism and press freedom in the liberal sense, focusing on the context and conditions that enhance the role of journalism, especially the practice of journalistic investigation, in democratic and liberal states. In fact, the ability to investigate and control the press is linked essentially and basically on the conditions of freedom, the independence of the judiciary, and legal restrictions to arbitrary government actions [11, 12]. The fact that freedom of the press is one of the prerequisite for the right to information, the right to seek information and the right to disseminate information. Within the limits that do not harm the legitimate interests of the democratic political system, and that the media is one of the important tools or actors in fight against corruption, which requires the collective participation of the official and unofficial bodies [13]. However, some studies, which have a critical trend in media freedom, are beginning to pay attention to the conditions of the political economy and the context of special interests and market imperatives, which mortgage and constrain the work of a free and private press. The press reflects the strong and influential interests of society. It cannot go beyond some red lines in investigations and investigations about corruption, where press freedom is just a mere theory and an ideal [14–16]. Many critical journalism scholars from democratic countries, especially the United States of America, point out that the press is under the authority of influential elites who make public opinion, manipulating minds in the words of Herbert Schiller [17–19].

However, effectively, the role of the press cannot be neglected in uncovering corruption throughout the globe. Many corruption-related issues have been leaked to the media and have been exposed to the media and have led to political changes such as the fall of Governments. The Watergate scandal led to the downfall of the Nixon presidency in the United States; similar incidents are found in European cases, and in the rest of the world's democracies, and even in non-democratic states within permissible limits. There was an optimistic view that freedom given to the press by political authority and society can provide many corruption-related

investigations to be achieved. Some researches attempted to establish a causal relationship between press freedom and the ability of the press to investigate in corruption and to fight it [11, 12, 20–22]. How the press in some third world societies, especially in South-East Asia and Africa, has made significant contributions to the fight against corruption [23, 24]. Governments are also deliberately, when it decided to establish campaigns against corruption, using the written press and all other media to uncover corruption or only to liquidate opposition wings within power.

Given the technological development and the entry of the world to the Internet era, since the end of the twentieth century, the new communication technologies associated with globalization acceleration have been introduced. In their last version, new technics and expanding horizons in the field of press freedom have the capacity to detect and confront corruption. The electronic press now is very much associated with the field of cyber media, use of investigations and the dissemination of information on large and uncontrolled social networking. Thus press has played an important role in highlighting and enhancing the role of journalism and press investigations in detecting corruption, reducing the risk and cost of investigative work, and journalistic dissemination of corruption cases and issues [9, 25], although threats to the physical integrity of journalists and the prosecution and security pursuit of them and to the press institutions still persist. However, fighting and confronting corruption is where the press plays a role, by defaming corruption cases and its prominent personalities, by providing full information to public. But such prominent task does not fully achieved.

There is serious lack of literature and studies about corruption narratives and discourse, as a new theoretical tool to understand its consequences and how to conceptualize. One of such studies seeks to find how it constructs state and political images among citizens, Gupta studies, presented such findings. The narratives about corruption help to understand citizens' expectations about what the state does and what it can do, how bureaucracy responds to the Citizen's needs, and how the allocated money for the development and improvement of citizens' lives goes to the pockets of corrupt people [26, 27]. In the Chinese case, the press tries to have a social role through investigative journalism, but it does not amount to separate authority facing the governmental one, as in the Anglo-American way. But the situation of the press is similar to the status of an non-crowned king, where the press is focused on the reproduction of cultural values [28]. What is more important in the context of the narrative analysis is how to build corruption stories in journalism. What does the press offer about corruption and the perpetrators of corrupt practices and those who confront them? This is not just about telling stories of corruption, or how they should be addressed, instead, is about building the corruption narratives, and its reflects on the functions and tasks of journalism in detecting it, and how its lead to a construction and imaginary about state and authority. In this regard, the narratives provided by the press and journalists about their anticorruption tasks and corruption, differ in context and contents from one country to another. The corruption narrative is an important subject in the struggle between the Chinese government and the opposition over legitimacy and reproduction of it. The opposition uses corruption theme to prove immorality and incompetence of established regime. While China is economic, success has allowed anti-corruption narrative manipulation, focusing on the role of the state in successful economic development including the fight against corruption, and social stability and citizen's prosperity [29]. In the Arab world, many studies have emphasized the influence of the authoritarian climate of political systems on journalism. And how this impedes the process of investigative journalism. Although the barrier of fear of regimes was partially eliminated after the events of the Arab Spring in 2011, many Arab political regimes are aware of the seriousness of social networks over the Internet, so

**105**

*Traditional and Online Journalism and Corruption Investigation Issues: The Case of Algeria*

**3. Algeria and the conditions of journalism and corruption**

journalism face two problems: corruption and authoritarianism.

they has retightened control over the online journalism and traditional journalism after 2011 [30, 31]. This authoritarian reality prevents the formation of an effective role for the press in the fight against corruption, as reflected in the journalism narrative about corruption. The journalistic practice of detecting corruption can be debunked through the media's reporting of corruption and its information, through the structure of the press narrative of corruption, and the degree of plotting and mastery in detailing issues related to corruption. Although previous studies have highlighted the role of the press in combating corruption in many cases, few studies have focused on the content of the press on corruption, in terms of the discourse adopted against corruption, and the narrative structure it presented on this topic.

Algeria has its specifics situation to some extent within the Arab and African world, in the freedom of journalistic work and freedom of expression in general term. Algeria's position in some international reports and global indicators concerning democracy and corruption makes Algeria as one of the countries with high degree in corruption, and modest degrees in freedom of the press, journalistic work and civil liberties in the country is shrinking. Thus, does Thus, does not raise them to to the ranks of democratic regimes or electoral democracies. Corruption has penetrated every sphere in Algeria journalistic works, and confronting corruption in journalistic terms is risky and adventurous, within predetermined limits. More than two decades after President Abdelaziz Bouteflika took office, and despite Algeria was out of the black decade, the Indicators of corruption, democracy and freedom of the press have not improved much. International reports usually, repeat Algeria's ranking among countries where corruption is high and press freedom is low, and classified among the less transparent and non-free states [32–34]. Although there is a margin of media freedom in Algeria, the Algerian private press has repeatedly attacked and criticized government policies, [32], But journalism and investigative

Statements and sentences condemning the restriction on the work of journalists and their continued detention echoed in many international reports, which classify Algeria as one of the countries where journalists do not enjoy freedom. There is no freedom of the press. The classification of Algeria in the Freedom House rating does not exceed 35 points from 100 in the Freedom new Standard since 2016. The reports of this center considered Algeria as non-free country, (Freedom House, 2018) the reports cites some incidents in which journalists have been arrested or prosecuted and charged with defamation, libeling, or undermining political institutions and state symbols. However, there is a remarkable margin of freedom in the press, that makes the latter criticize offensively the government's actions, and draws criticism to the political situation in the context of the free opinion press and articles column, and in the context of venting political tension. Through this close freedom margin, Algerian government tries to prove the existence of pluralism in the form of media and in its content. There are, however, government harassment of the press, human rights and journalists' rights organizations, accusing the government of cracking down on journalists, imprisoning, and arresting them, such as the arrest of the journalist and the director of the newspaper Al-Masa in French in 2004, against the background of writing a book criticizing the President [35]. The accusations were strongly denied by the government and governmental media. By making clear that Algeria has seen progress in journalism freedom, government has given advantages and paid the care attention to journalism, and confirm that Algeria has registered a remarkable rise in press headlines and titles over two decades, surpassing 40

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85925*

*Traditional and Online Journalism and Corruption Investigation Issues: The Case of Algeria DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85925*

they has retightened control over the online journalism and traditional journalism after 2011 [30, 31]. This authoritarian reality prevents the formation of an effective role for the press in the fight against corruption, as reflected in the journalism narrative about corruption. The journalistic practice of detecting corruption can be debunked through the media's reporting of corruption and its information, through the structure of the press narrative of corruption, and the degree of plotting and mastery in detailing issues related to corruption. Although previous studies have highlighted the role of the press in combating corruption in many cases, few studies have focused on the content of the press on corruption, in terms of the discourse adopted against corruption, and the narrative structure it presented on this topic.

#### **3. Algeria and the conditions of journalism and corruption**

Algeria has its specifics situation to some extent within the Arab and African world, in the freedom of journalistic work and freedom of expression in general term. Algeria's position in some international reports and global indicators concerning democracy and corruption makes Algeria as one of the countries with high degree in corruption, and modest degrees in freedom of the press, journalistic work and civil liberties in the country is shrinking. Thus, does Thus, does not raise them to to the ranks of democratic regimes or electoral democracies. Corruption has penetrated every sphere in Algeria journalistic works, and confronting corruption in journalistic terms is risky and adventurous, within predetermined limits. More than two decades after President Abdelaziz Bouteflika took office, and despite Algeria was out of the black decade, the Indicators of corruption, democracy and freedom of the press have not improved much. International reports usually, repeat Algeria's ranking among countries where corruption is high and press freedom is low, and classified among the less transparent and non-free states [32–34]. Although there is a margin of media freedom in Algeria, the Algerian private press has repeatedly attacked and criticized government policies, [32], But journalism and investigative journalism face two problems: corruption and authoritarianism.

Statements and sentences condemning the restriction on the work of journalists and their continued detention echoed in many international reports, which classify Algeria as one of the countries where journalists do not enjoy freedom. There is no freedom of the press. The classification of Algeria in the Freedom House rating does not exceed 35 points from 100 in the Freedom new Standard since 2016. The reports of this center considered Algeria as non-free country, (Freedom House, 2018) the reports cites some incidents in which journalists have been arrested or prosecuted and charged with defamation, libeling, or undermining political institutions and state symbols. However, there is a remarkable margin of freedom in the press, that makes the latter criticize offensively the government's actions, and draws criticism to the political situation in the context of the free opinion press and articles column, and in the context of venting political tension. Through this close freedom margin, Algerian government tries to prove the existence of pluralism in the form of media and in its content. There are, however, government harassment of the press, human rights and journalists' rights organizations, accusing the government of cracking down on journalists, imprisoning, and arresting them, such as the arrest of the journalist and the director of the newspaper Al-Masa in French in 2004, against the background of writing a book criticizing the President [35]. The accusations were strongly denied by the government and governmental media. By making clear that Algeria has seen progress in journalism freedom, government has given advantages and paid the care attention to journalism, and confirm that Algeria has registered a remarkable rise in press headlines and titles over two decades, surpassing 40

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

such prominent task does not fully achieved.

investigations to be achieved. Some researches attempted to establish a causal relationship between press freedom and the ability of the press to investigate in corruption and to fight it [11, 12, 20–22]. How the press in some third world societies, especially in South-East Asia and Africa, has made significant contributions to the fight against corruption [23, 24]. Governments are also deliberately, when it decided to establish campaigns against corruption, using the written press and all other media to uncover corruption or only to liquidate opposition wings within power. Given the technological development and the entry of the world to the Internet era, since the end of the twentieth century, the new communication technologies associated with globalization acceleration have been introduced. In their last version, new technics and expanding horizons in the field of press freedom have the capacity to detect and confront corruption. The electronic press now is very much associated with the field of cyber media, use of investigations and the dissemination of information on large and uncontrolled social networking. Thus press has played an important role in highlighting and enhancing the role of journalism and press investigations in detecting corruption, reducing the risk and cost of investigative work, and journalistic dissemination of corruption cases and issues [9, 25], although threats to the physical integrity of journalists and the prosecution and security pursuit of them and to the press institutions still persist. However, fighting and confronting corruption is where the press plays a role, by defaming corruption cases and its prominent personalities, by providing full information to public. But

There is serious lack of literature and studies about corruption narratives and discourse, as a new theoretical tool to understand its consequences and how to conceptualize. One of such studies seeks to find how it constructs state and political images among citizens, Gupta studies, presented such findings. The narratives about corruption help to understand citizens' expectations about what the state does and what it can do, how bureaucracy responds to the Citizen's needs, and how the allocated money for the development and improvement of citizens' lives goes to the pockets of corrupt people [26, 27]. In the Chinese case, the press tries to have a social role through investigative journalism, but it does not amount to separate authority facing the governmental one, as in the Anglo-American way. But the situation of the press is similar to the status of an non-crowned king, where the press is focused on the reproduction of cultural values [28]. What is more important in the context of the narrative analysis is how to build corruption stories in journalism. What does the press offer about corruption and the perpetrators of corrupt practices and those who confront them? This is not just about telling stories of corruption, or how they should be addressed, instead, is about building the corruption narratives, and its reflects on the functions and tasks of journalism in detecting it, and how its lead to a construction and imaginary about state and authority. In this regard, the narratives provided by the press and journalists about their anticorruption tasks and corruption, differ in context and contents from one country to another. The corruption narrative is an important subject in the struggle between the Chinese government and the opposition over legitimacy and reproduction of it. The opposition uses corruption theme to prove immorality and incompetence of established regime. While China is economic, success has allowed anti-corruption narrative manipulation, focusing on the role of the state in successful economic development including the fight against corruption, and social stability and citizen's prosperity [29]. In the Arab world, many studies have emphasized the influence of the authoritarian climate of political systems on journalism. And how this impedes the process of investigative journalism. Although the barrier of fear of regimes was partially eliminated after the events of the Arab Spring in 2011, many Arab political regimes are aware of the seriousness of social networks over the Internet, so

**104**

newspaper titles and more than 20 television channels after its licensing in 2014. Before 2000, the written press title numbers counted on the fingers, the number of these titles has increased and multiplied several times over the past 10 years. The government also opened the way for media pluralism, in the audiovisual field, by issuing a law regulating the audiovisual media in 2014, but the press law issued in 2011 has given a broad powers for the government to intervene in newspaper's closure, and censoring the investigative publication that affect national security or economic state interests and sensitive special affairs. At the same time, the government's has limited updated control on new e-communication technology. In addition, there is an increasing tendency of youth generations and citizens to resort social networking, especially Facebook; this social network by the emergence of several pure online newspapers, and the media institutions produce traditional paper newspapers established online version of their paper publications. This media pluralism has made possible to increase the level of boldness in dealing with many sensitive subjects that were forbidden in the decade of the last century.

Critics of the press and journalistic situation in Algeria argue that journalism's situation has not improved substantially, and that censorship and government control over news circulation, are still in place, although this censorship is ineffective [36–38]. Active press institutions, mostly under the governmental control, are affiliated to government and political authority. The government is exerting various means of pressure on journalistic work by monopolizing the power to distribute publicity to daily newspapers. Many daily newspapers are closed down after they were declared bankrupt and the government has been asked for debts owed by it, because of depriving publicity quotas, which generates profits on the newspapers, far exceeds the profits they do not derive from their newspaper copies distribution. Thus, Driss argues that the state's control over the media landscape, despite entering the electronic media, has evolved, and has become a control over the transmission of information, and the dissemination of news in both traditional and electronic newspapers [39]. What helped, however, was the humble readability of newspapers in Algeria, especially for purely electronic newspapers [39]. In addition, despite, the mass media characterized by multiple media titles, the access and use Internet is uncensored. But journalism activity is closely controlled, the free press investigations are difficult to be achieved, in conditions described by Driss as follows: "there is a free Expression but without freedom of the press" [40]. So the media scene has become a mere echo of what the state news agency says, and is barely out of scope, except in a narrow range, or through some of the online newspapers and blogs that are active outside the country.

These conditions make the presswork in Algeria without the capacity or the means to become an effective one, or that has the capacity to detect or investigate corruption cases in an independent, protected and secure manner. The economic and social conditions in which journalists work are discouraging and the lack of training are required by young journalists for journalism. This is reflected in the form of journalistic works, in which investigations and reports are limited. The journalist does an essay rather than writing it; Mustafawi comments on that, and ads: the public press is the public press of the rumor [41]. Most corruption cases, published by the newspapers, are the echo of information that the government, or other authorities and incumbents, allow to disseminate. It is therefore a common practice in journalism writing, that he or she do not mention the real sources of the news, or attribute sources to unknown. Not to mention the talk about the conduct of public affairs and the corruption occurs on it, falls within the silent or non-talkable, because access to information and access to it for journalists remains a matter of ink on paper in the legal texts [42]. It has also been reflected in the existence of non-professional journalistic practices, which focus on the dissemination of some

**107**

*Traditional and Online Journalism and Corruption Investigation Issues: The Case of Algeria*

selves to be victims exploited in these corrupted perpetrator.

**4. Journalism in Algeria and narratives of corruption**

The hypothesis formulated about the impact of the authoritarian political conditions on the journalism's production of corruption narratives is very clear and strong in the Algerian case. The press story, and the media narrative produced by the Algerian press on corruption issues, characterized for at least two decades by great homogeneity. There are similar accounts and stories reported by newspapers on the same subject. This is possibly due to the limited availability of information sources, and to the new authoritarian conditions that lead to a failure to go beyond the official central narrative. This does not reveal the official face necessarily, and it is an incomplete narrative, missing several elements of the novel and narrative, which are necessary to convince the Algerian reader, the later turned to conspiracy theory to fill the gaps and mysteries of the inconclusive narrative about corruption

false and unreliable news attributed to unknown sources. There is common phrase repeatedly cited in like news: "a source who declined to be identified Said". The cases, we are going to show about corruption, and trials have taken place around, confirm this. Although corruption issues as titles in newspapers is one of the things that attracts readers to buy newspapers and to follow their news, there are limits in front of journalists and journalistic work in talking about corruption and its issues, which is reflected in the corruption stories telling in such journalism. These narratives, in turn, are subject to interpretation and political employment, and are subjected to narrative confusion, when they are politicized, through comments and statements attributed to political actors, or to unknown sources, that wish to leak information to the press according to their own interests, or who consider them-

Despite the emergence of some online newspapers in Algeria, they neither constitute an important exception in the investigation about corruption cases, nor in the field of self-censorship or harassment by authorities. In 2017, the info website: TSA was blocked for at least 2 days, because of its diffusion of some news about the president and his surroundings. The exception remains in directing more criticism and exposing the corruption stories by some journalists working abroad, who have been able to increase the audacity and ability to access sensitive information about corruption can give a different account of what the government was trying to publish. But it is limited to employing social media such as Facebook or creating pages for online newspapers and blogs that are not accredited in Algeria. This allowed the penetration of many walls, and raised many issues and campaigns against corruption and unmasking many of its secrets. Nevertheless, this did not alter the situation fundamentally, in that the journalistic work is a vector of corruption's crimes and the facts of the trials around it. And does not play an important role in the investigation or disclosure of its actual limbs, the journalistic work in Algeria cannot exercise the function of institutional media monitoring and watchdog, although the press enjoys a margin of Freedom and offensive criticism of government policies. However, the ability to expose corruption cases in an independent and professional manner remains elusive, and the role is only to convey the news of these issues, and to cover up the judicial and security institutions fighting against corruption, by transferring the facts of the trials in the context of permissible leaks on security and judicial investigations of those events. Even the online journals in their overwhelming parts who is outside of government's control in its parts who is outside of government Guardianship, which adopts positions of opposition, lacks professionalism, and objectivity, its being transformed into a mere transfer of the opinion of a section of the hardline opposition against the political regime.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85925*

#### *Traditional and Online Journalism and Corruption Investigation Issues: The Case of Algeria DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85925*

false and unreliable news attributed to unknown sources. There is common phrase repeatedly cited in like news: "a source who declined to be identified Said". The cases, we are going to show about corruption, and trials have taken place around, confirm this. Although corruption issues as titles in newspapers is one of the things that attracts readers to buy newspapers and to follow their news, there are limits in front of journalists and journalistic work in talking about corruption and its issues, which is reflected in the corruption stories telling in such journalism. These narratives, in turn, are subject to interpretation and political employment, and are subjected to narrative confusion, when they are politicized, through comments and statements attributed to political actors, or to unknown sources, that wish to leak information to the press according to their own interests, or who consider themselves to be victims exploited in these corrupted perpetrator.

Despite the emergence of some online newspapers in Algeria, they neither constitute an important exception in the investigation about corruption cases, nor in the field of self-censorship or harassment by authorities. In 2017, the info website: TSA was blocked for at least 2 days, because of its diffusion of some news about the president and his surroundings. The exception remains in directing more criticism and exposing the corruption stories by some journalists working abroad, who have been able to increase the audacity and ability to access sensitive information about corruption can give a different account of what the government was trying to publish. But it is limited to employing social media such as Facebook or creating pages for online newspapers and blogs that are not accredited in Algeria. This allowed the penetration of many walls, and raised many issues and campaigns against corruption and unmasking many of its secrets. Nevertheless, this did not alter the situation fundamentally, in that the journalistic work is a vector of corruption's crimes and the facts of the trials around it. And does not play an important role in the investigation or disclosure of its actual limbs, the journalistic work in Algeria cannot exercise the function of institutional media monitoring and watchdog, although the press enjoys a margin of Freedom and offensive criticism of government policies. However, the ability to expose corruption cases in an independent and professional manner remains elusive, and the role is only to convey the news of these issues, and to cover up the judicial and security institutions fighting against corruption, by transferring the facts of the trials in the context of permissible leaks on security and judicial investigations of those events. Even the online journals in their overwhelming parts who is outside of government's control in its parts who is outside of government Guardianship, which adopts positions of opposition, lacks professionalism, and objectivity, its being transformed into a mere transfer of the opinion of a section of the hardline opposition against the political regime.

#### **4. Journalism in Algeria and narratives of corruption**

The hypothesis formulated about the impact of the authoritarian political conditions on the journalism's production of corruption narratives is very clear and strong in the Algerian case. The press story, and the media narrative produced by the Algerian press on corruption issues, characterized for at least two decades by great homogeneity. There are similar accounts and stories reported by newspapers on the same subject. This is possibly due to the limited availability of information sources, and to the new authoritarian conditions that lead to a failure to go beyond the official central narrative. This does not reveal the official face necessarily, and it is an incomplete narrative, missing several elements of the novel and narrative, which are necessary to convince the Algerian reader, the later turned to conspiracy theory to fill the gaps and mysteries of the inconclusive narrative about corruption

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

sensitive subjects that were forbidden in the decade of the last century.

Critics of the press and journalistic situation in Algeria argue that journalism's situation has not improved substantially, and that censorship and government control over news circulation, are still in place, although this censorship is ineffective [36–38]. Active press institutions, mostly under the governmental control, are affiliated to government and political authority. The government is exerting various means of pressure on journalistic work by monopolizing the power to distribute publicity to daily newspapers. Many daily newspapers are closed down after they were declared bankrupt and the government has been asked for debts owed by it, because of depriving publicity quotas, which generates profits on the newspapers, far exceeds the profits they do not derive from their newspaper copies distribution. Thus, Driss argues that the state's control over the media landscape, despite entering the electronic media, has evolved, and has become a control over the transmission of information, and the dissemination of news in both traditional and electronic newspapers [39]. What helped, however, was the humble readability of newspapers in Algeria, especially for purely electronic newspapers [39]. In addition, despite, the mass media characterized by multiple media titles, the access and use Internet is uncensored. But journalism activity is closely controlled, the free press investigations are difficult to be achieved, in conditions described by Driss as follows: "there is a free Expression but without freedom of the press" [40]. So the media scene has become a mere echo of what the state news agency says, and is barely out of scope, except in a narrow range, or through some of the online newspapers and blogs that

These conditions make the presswork in Algeria without the capacity or the means to become an effective one, or that has the capacity to detect or investigate corruption cases in an independent, protected and secure manner. The economic and social conditions in which journalists work are discouraging and the lack of training are required by young journalists for journalism. This is reflected in the form of journalistic works, in which investigations and reports are limited. The journalist does an essay rather than writing it; Mustafawi comments on that, and ads: the public press is the public press of the rumor [41]. Most corruption cases, published by the newspapers, are the echo of information that the government, or other authorities and incumbents, allow to disseminate. It is therefore a common practice in journalism writing, that he or she do not mention the real sources of the news, or attribute sources to unknown. Not to mention the talk about the conduct of public affairs and the corruption occurs on it, falls within the silent or non-talkable, because access to information and access to it for journalists remains a matter of ink on paper in the legal texts [42]. It has also been reflected in the existence of non-professional journalistic practices, which focus on the dissemination of some

newspaper titles and more than 20 television channels after its licensing in 2014. Before 2000, the written press title numbers counted on the fingers, the number of these titles has increased and multiplied several times over the past 10 years. The government also opened the way for media pluralism, in the audiovisual field, by issuing a law regulating the audiovisual media in 2014, but the press law issued in 2011 has given a broad powers for the government to intervene in newspaper's closure, and censoring the investigative publication that affect national security or economic state interests and sensitive special affairs. At the same time, the government's has limited updated control on new e-communication technology. In addition, there is an increasing tendency of youth generations and citizens to resort social networking, especially Facebook; this social network by the emergence of several pure online newspapers, and the media institutions produce traditional paper newspapers established online version of their paper publications. This media pluralism has made possible to increase the level of boldness in dealing with many

**106**

are active outside the country.

issues, and about who is behind the senior actors. On the other hand, who is the real and responsible actor in these issues?

Three cases of corruption can be analyzed, demonstrating the premise and the importance of journalistic narrative handling. These issues are the arrest and prosecution of the President of the Bank of al-Khalifa, in what is known as "Trial of the Century". The second issue is the highway scandal, known as the "scandal of the century". The third issue, which is still very ambiguous and unresolved in terms of media: the case of Sonatrach 1 and 2. In all these cases, arresting of those attributed as a principal suspect. All of these cases are cases of misappropriation of public funds through embezzlement, corruption and currency smuggling, but some elements of these three issues remain a mystery that the press has been unable to resolve or dare to do, despite the reluctance of news outside of what is unofficial about these issues.

The case of Khalifa Bank: dating back to 2003, when a loophole and bankruptcies were discovered at the level of the bank, estimated at \$1.5–\$2 billion. The Algerian judiciary and police were investigated in this corruption case inside and outside the bank. The investigation included more than 4000 person, most notably the bank's chief executive, Abdulmoumen Khalifa, who fled to Britain and was extradited to Algeria in 2013. The damage included some 111 public agencies and institutions, some of them were established as a civil party and a victim of the bank. Some 124 defendants, including the social security fund and Sonatrach National Company, deposited their funds in this bank, motivated by attractive banking benefits and guarantees, which amounts to 17% as interest rate [35, 43]. But it did not recover its money, and has led to a government-estimated loss of about \$8 billion, but the press reported much higher figures besides the number announced by the government. This case was called the scandal of the century. During trials, group of perpetrators and defendants were convicted, especially the main accused in this case, bank director Abdelmuomen Khalifa, where he was sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment in 2007, and after his arrest and receipt from London in the same year, he was sentenced to 18 years in prison on 23 June 2014. However, it is noted that the list of accused has changed, and some ministers and some political figures known as witnesses have been summoned in the case. The press investigation, in most cases, has not followed up on trials, and with some information on suspicions regarding the manner in which the bank, began its activity in 1998, got a loan from the Local Development Bank (BDL).

**The issue of the highway scandal**: this issue is one of the issues known nationally and internationally about the spread of corruption in public institutions. The case of the East-West Highway exploded after the announcement of irregularities in transactions and abuses in this project. This led to a security investigation, and the transfer of this file to justice in the investigation, some of what is quoted by the press, is that the project was completed by the Chinese company; "CITIC CRC", in amount of \$6 billion dollars. The cost of the project reached 16 billion. Freedom House's 2015 report on this incident cited that this project is one of the most expensive projects of its kind in the world [44]. The issue is about corruption and bribery, and the making of suspicious transactions with some foreign companies, including amplification of invoices, involving some administrative officials, including Director of the National Highway Agency, Planning Directorate of the Ministry of Public Works, in addition to the Secretary General of the later Ministry, some cadres in the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Transport, some businesspersons and contractors. Some direct responsible of the project were charged, but the press gave some critical views of the proceedings, about how some well-known political figures, and senior officials did not appear on the scene, and were not charged. The press reported that the judicial investigation included 16 people from 7 foreign

**109**

*Traditional and Online Journalism and Corruption Investigation Issues: The Case of Algeria*

companies. The key officials, including the new project manager was sentenced to 10 years in prison, and the main defendant in the case is the Chinese company's consultant to the ministry to complete the route. The court issued fines against seven foreign companies that contracted in the project. The Secretary-General of

**The Sonatrach 1 and 2 cases** reveal the corruption issues at Sonatrach. This company was a closed fortress for journalists; as they were not allowed getting investigations within its cases. According to journalist Jilali Hajjaj: "It is a difficult company for journalists to investigate and any attempt to do so is quickly halted" [35]. Two of the corruption case in this public company: called in the press; the Sonatrach 1 and Sonatrach 2, which deal with the existence of suspicious transactions between the national company of Sonatrach and other foreign companies from Italy, the smuggling of funds abroad. The trial included the former general manager and a group of Sonatrach executives. They were charged for bribery, smuggling of funds and waste of public money. Some charges are directed to the Minister of Energy and the mines: Chakib Khelil, but without entering the trial. Although the press at that time has reported that the court ordered his arrest with his sons and wife. In addition to another person named figure: Farid Bedjaoui. The attorney general of the Algiers Judicial Council charged them for corruption and wasting public money, in dealing with an Italian company and receiving bribes from them, and concluding illegal deals with them. The court has not substantiated any evidence against him. Suddenly all the charges and suspicions against him were dropped later suspicions against him later, and even dropped the charges against the defendants in the first stage, the talk about this story in the newspapers was closed

These three events, linked to corruption, differ in the way the story presented and the structure of the narrative, in terms of the sequence of events and in the end drawn to it. Till the end, it is clear to some extent in the case of the Khalifa Bank and in the case of the highway by entering the characters to the scene of the court. The story end is settled in the cases of Sonatrach 1 and 2. The narrative, given to those corruption cases, is beset by many gaps and disturbances in the narrative structure, by changing the characters charged in the novel, and conflicting news about the main and actual defendants. What is common in these cases is the disappearance of the charges and the accused from high-ranking officials and government political

Most of the press articles, which are covered in the study, are from eight newspapers (four in Arabic and two in French) in addition to two purely electronic newspapers (pure player) that wrote about corruption cases, they belong to articles that cover up the proceedings of trials, the second type are those that relate to interviews with public or political figures, or lawyers for those accused of corruption, human rights activists and political party figures. The third category is of daily articles

In these three cases, about corruption, there are no leaks of official documents, or strong documentary evidences, which could constitute a pre-press, and make the press a prominent actor in the detection of corruption. All these issues were not disclosed by press media, at first glance, for example, through an independent

figures who either turned into witnesses or being tolerated.

**5. Narrative analysis for the data and discussion**

columns that are written in some newspapers.

**5.1 Analysis and discussion**

the Ministry was acquitted, after being sentenced in the first trial.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85925*

later and was forgotten.

#### *Traditional and Online Journalism and Corruption Investigation Issues: The Case of Algeria DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85925*

companies. The key officials, including the new project manager was sentenced to 10 years in prison, and the main defendant in the case is the Chinese company's consultant to the ministry to complete the route. The court issued fines against seven foreign companies that contracted in the project. The Secretary-General of the Ministry was acquitted, after being sentenced in the first trial.

**The Sonatrach 1 and 2 cases** reveal the corruption issues at Sonatrach. This company was a closed fortress for journalists; as they were not allowed getting investigations within its cases. According to journalist Jilali Hajjaj: "It is a difficult company for journalists to investigate and any attempt to do so is quickly halted" [35]. Two of the corruption case in this public company: called in the press; the Sonatrach 1 and Sonatrach 2, which deal with the existence of suspicious transactions between the national company of Sonatrach and other foreign companies from Italy, the smuggling of funds abroad. The trial included the former general manager and a group of Sonatrach executives. They were charged for bribery, smuggling of funds and waste of public money. Some charges are directed to the Minister of Energy and the mines: Chakib Khelil, but without entering the trial. Although the press at that time has reported that the court ordered his arrest with his sons and wife. In addition to another person named figure: Farid Bedjaoui. The attorney general of the Algiers Judicial Council charged them for corruption and wasting public money, in dealing with an Italian company and receiving bribes from them, and concluding illegal deals with them. The court has not substantiated any evidence against him. Suddenly all the charges and suspicions against him were dropped later suspicions against him later, and even dropped the charges against the defendants in the first stage, the talk about this story in the newspapers was closed later and was forgotten.

These three events, linked to corruption, differ in the way the story presented and the structure of the narrative, in terms of the sequence of events and in the end drawn to it. Till the end, it is clear to some extent in the case of the Khalifa Bank and in the case of the highway by entering the characters to the scene of the court. The story end is settled in the cases of Sonatrach 1 and 2. The narrative, given to those corruption cases, is beset by many gaps and disturbances in the narrative structure, by changing the characters charged in the novel, and conflicting news about the main and actual defendants. What is common in these cases is the disappearance of the charges and the accused from high-ranking officials and government political figures who either turned into witnesses or being tolerated.

#### **5. Narrative analysis for the data and discussion**

Most of the press articles, which are covered in the study, are from eight newspapers (four in Arabic and two in French) in addition to two purely electronic newspapers (pure player) that wrote about corruption cases, they belong to articles that cover up the proceedings of trials, the second type are those that relate to interviews with public or political figures, or lawyers for those accused of corruption, human rights activists and political party figures. The third category is of daily articles columns that are written in some newspapers.

#### **5.1 Analysis and discussion**

In these three cases, about corruption, there are no leaks of official documents, or strong documentary evidences, which could constitute a pre-press, and make the press a prominent actor in the detection of corruption. All these issues were not disclosed by press media, at first glance, for example, through an independent

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

and responsible actor in these issues?

the Local Development Bank (BDL).

about these issues.

issues, and about who is behind the senior actors. On the other hand, who is the real

The case of Khalifa Bank: dating back to 2003, when a loophole and bankruptcies were discovered at the level of the bank, estimated at \$1.5–\$2 billion. The Algerian judiciary and police were investigated in this corruption case inside and outside the bank. The investigation included more than 4000 person, most notably the bank's chief executive, Abdulmoumen Khalifa, who fled to Britain and was extradited to Algeria in 2013. The damage included some 111 public agencies and institutions, some of them were established as a civil party and a victim of the bank. Some 124 defendants, including the social security fund and Sonatrach National Company, deposited their funds in this bank, motivated by attractive banking benefits and guarantees, which amounts to 17% as interest rate [35, 43]. But it did not recover its money, and has led to a government-estimated loss of about \$8 billion, but the press reported much higher figures besides the number announced by the government. This case was called the scandal of the century. During trials, group of perpetrators and defendants were convicted, especially the main accused in this case, bank director Abdelmuomen Khalifa, where he was sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment in 2007, and after his arrest and receipt from London in the same year, he was sentenced to 18 years in prison on 23 June 2014. However, it is noted that the list of accused has changed, and some ministers and some political figures known as witnesses have been summoned in the case. The press investigation, in most cases, has not followed up on trials, and with some information on suspicions regarding the manner in which the bank, began its activity in 1998, got a loan from

**The issue of the highway scandal**: this issue is one of the issues known nationally and internationally about the spread of corruption in public institutions. The case of the East-West Highway exploded after the announcement of irregularities in transactions and abuses in this project. This led to a security investigation, and the transfer of this file to justice in the investigation, some of what is quoted by the press, is that the project was completed by the Chinese company; "CITIC CRC", in amount of \$6 billion dollars. The cost of the project reached 16 billion. Freedom House's 2015 report on this incident cited that this project is one of the most expensive projects of its kind in the world [44]. The issue is about corruption and bribery, and the making of suspicious transactions with some foreign companies, including amplification of invoices, involving some administrative officials, including Director of the National Highway Agency, Planning Directorate of the Ministry of Public Works, in addition to the Secretary General of the later Ministry, some cadres in the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Transport, some businesspersons and contractors. Some direct responsible of the project were charged, but the press gave some critical views of the proceedings, about how some well-known political figures, and senior officials did not appear on the scene, and were not charged. The press reported that the judicial investigation included 16 people from 7 foreign

Three cases of corruption can be analyzed, demonstrating the premise and the importance of journalistic narrative handling. These issues are the arrest and prosecution of the President of the Bank of al-Khalifa, in what is known as "Trial of the Century". The second issue is the highway scandal, known as the "scandal of the century". The third issue, which is still very ambiguous and unresolved in terms of media: the case of Sonatrach 1 and 2. In all these cases, arresting of those attributed as a principal suspect. All of these cases are cases of misappropriation of public funds through embezzlement, corruption and currency smuggling, but some elements of these three issues remain a mystery that the press has been unable to resolve or dare to do, despite the reluctance of news outside of what is unofficial

**108**

investigative journalism, but were triggered initially by the presence of information from international sources outside the country, or by police inspections, and the investigation of these cases was moved by the security institutions or the justice system. The journalism provides only a critical account of the proceedings of the corruption trial. It does not provide an integrated account explaining how to do such corruption, who are the full parties involved in. The articles do not tend to reveal the sources of the news, especially statements revealing secret or new information, but the press tends to justify the protection of the source information to refer to what is claimed as "trusted sources", or to personalities whose name has not requested, or who has refused to disclose its identity.

The second element concerning the actor perpetrating the corruption's crime in the narrative analysis concerning the accused, most articles when talking about corruption refers to "other parties" or "other sides", and do not tell completely, how the real actors have not convicted, and the narratives develop into an escalating narrative: that the regime protects its men and instead of that, it provides only the involved persons of the second or of the third range in the corruption affair. The plot of the novel always seems incomplete. Traditionally, it appears in the form of a story about good and evil, where the final sanction has not been imposed on the perpetrator, and the real perpetrator has neither revealed nor sentenced. But it contains a statement and hinting most of the time that the perpetrator is always behind the curtain and disappears behind the scene of the trial. The question that always arises in these three issues is that these officials are essentially appointed; why did some senior officials appear in the trials but as witness, but later were removed from them. Note that there is a difference in the style of coverage between the Arabic newspapers and the Francophone newspapers. There are differences in boldness, clarity and statement, where *Alkhabar* newspaper has more ability to bold, the latter seems bolder in directing charges to sides accused of corruption, more inclined to politicize corruption, and that corruption is protected, there is no much difference in this style of charging between traditional newspapers and purely electronic newspapers. What is noticeable in the cases that have been disclosed is that the press coverage has not yielded significant political or informational results, and none of these three corruption scandals have led to direct accountability to any high official and have not led to the resignation of any high political personality either. Contrary to what is happening in other countries is known of its severity toward corruptions cases.

In the course of the narrative construction, about corruption and the related charges (what is the charge?); Algerian national newspapers are trying to construct narrative of corruption and its event, by linking it with what official declaration reveals, and that the state organs are resolutely tackling corruption effectively. The political opposition's rhetoric made the responsibility of corruption over the state's high officials, and on weak and bad performance of the government. Even deepening this narrative, in order to give the impression that the principal perpetrator of corruption is the supreme officials of the State, and that the State has the capacity and intention to protect its corrupt agents, especially its officials from the ranks of Ministers, instead of that, it sacrificed only junior staff. The narratives of the traditional and online newspapers shown about corruption, is dominated by the character of the uncompleted story, by using the third pronouns. There is almost an absence of the direct reportages or the investigations where the journalists or newspapers play a key role in the story. The journalists stay outside the story and take heterodiegetic narrator position [2], and sometimes the narrative refer to use the macro-narrative in telling corruption histories. By telling how it is linked historically to the political regime and its authoritarian nature, it is part of the political and legitimacy crisis of the political system. Some of the articles dealing with

**111**

*Traditional and Online Journalism and Corruption Investigation Issues: The Case of Algeria*

how their reactions were on the sentences handed down against them.

were devoted to the official story as a dominant narration.

truth, the press wonders about the truth.

**6. Conclusion**

corruption issues provide us with this method of macro-narratives. While articles dealing with trial proceedings are dominated by the use of partial narrative (micronarrative), and dive into trial proceedings, where the reader can be distracted and reoriented from the story of corruption, to sub-story of the proceedings of corruptions accused or perpetrators, and tell what charges were brought against them, and

What is noticeable about the articles in the three cases of corruption: the case of the Khalifa Bank, the cases of Sonatrach 1 and 2 and the East-West highway case, is that the element of the place in the story or the theater (scene) revolves in most of these cases in court, the court is the one in which the story is relisted, and where events are rearranged, and the frequency between events is established. The court is the place where corruption is formally and officially defined and judged. Corruption is recognized and publicized only within the court as a place, and there are no other places, where a major issue of corruption is uncovered, the newspapers

The press in Algeria is merely telling the story of corruption (story teller) as events reported that are not directly investigated, and exposed only some figures who are not political, or just carry out tasks and functions of technocratic jobs. In the articles that are in the form of interviews, they partially present fragments of the whole story, not the real actor in corruption. Some newspapers seem bolder in uncovering corruption, through dialogs, and through opinion columns than direct investigations, which are almost absent in large-scale corruption cases, and are only to cover up the scene or scene of the corruption trial in court. The audacity lies only in criticizing the government, or echoing the opposition's views on accusing the regime as a whole of corruption and illegality. Ironically, in light of the paucity of press investigations that can reveal major corruption cases, instead of looking at the

This study reveals that the role of journalism in fighting corruption in Algeria depends on the institutional and political context, where journalistic work remains very far from playing a key role in fighting corruption, and has no strong oversight role, unless it receives support from power factions or from one of the wings within ruling elite, which have an interest in leaking some information. On such a situation of the firm security strict security and political restraints, by legal and financial restrictions means on journalism work, and by indirect ways of controlling the mass media and daily newspapers, Throughout forbid allowing news releases of many corruption cases, under the pretext of security reasons and under pretext of law violation, concerning the inviolability of the reputation of persons, or that of moral persons and State institutions, under the charge of libel and spreading false news. This practice reflected the way how stories of corruption are reported in the online and traditional media alike, where it relies on re-narrating what others are saying about corruption, and the adoption of the official narration in the telling-story, which are characterized with mystery and lack of full elements and characters of the usual narration, and the incomplete full threads. Therefore, this kind of telling story about corruption, with poor unconvincing plot of the story, consolidates the reader's mistrust, and ordinary citizen's suspicion toward established political authority and ruling elite. This situation also strengthens the conviction that the actor in corruption cases remain always hidden behind the scene of the crime of corruption, and there is great protection for politicians and officials of the incumbency, so those peoples involved in corruption cases are only a scapegoats. Those

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85925*

#### *Traditional and Online Journalism and Corruption Investigation Issues: The Case of Algeria DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85925*

corruption issues provide us with this method of macro-narratives. While articles dealing with trial proceedings are dominated by the use of partial narrative (micronarrative), and dive into trial proceedings, where the reader can be distracted and reoriented from the story of corruption, to sub-story of the proceedings of corruptions accused or perpetrators, and tell what charges were brought against them, and how their reactions were on the sentences handed down against them.

What is noticeable about the articles in the three cases of corruption: the case of the Khalifa Bank, the cases of Sonatrach 1 and 2 and the East-West highway case, is that the element of the place in the story or the theater (scene) revolves in most of these cases in court, the court is the one in which the story is relisted, and where events are rearranged, and the frequency between events is established. The court is the place where corruption is formally and officially defined and judged. Corruption is recognized and publicized only within the court as a place, and there are no other places, where a major issue of corruption is uncovered, the newspapers were devoted to the official story as a dominant narration.

The press in Algeria is merely telling the story of corruption (story teller) as events reported that are not directly investigated, and exposed only some figures who are not political, or just carry out tasks and functions of technocratic jobs. In the articles that are in the form of interviews, they partially present fragments of the whole story, not the real actor in corruption. Some newspapers seem bolder in uncovering corruption, through dialogs, and through opinion columns than direct investigations, which are almost absent in large-scale corruption cases, and are only to cover up the scene or scene of the corruption trial in court. The audacity lies only in criticizing the government, or echoing the opposition's views on accusing the regime as a whole of corruption and illegality. Ironically, in light of the paucity of press investigations that can reveal major corruption cases, instead of looking at the truth, the press wonders about the truth.

#### **6. Conclusion**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

not requested, or who has refused to disclose its identity.

investigative journalism, but were triggered initially by the presence of information from international sources outside the country, or by police inspections, and the investigation of these cases was moved by the security institutions or the justice system. The journalism provides only a critical account of the proceedings of the corruption trial. It does not provide an integrated account explaining how to do such corruption, who are the full parties involved in. The articles do not tend to reveal the sources of the news, especially statements revealing secret or new information, but the press tends to justify the protection of the source information to refer to what is claimed as "trusted sources", or to personalities whose name has

The second element concerning the actor perpetrating the corruption's crime in the narrative analysis concerning the accused, most articles when talking about corruption refers to "other parties" or "other sides", and do not tell completely, how the real actors have not convicted, and the narratives develop into an escalating narrative: that the regime protects its men and instead of that, it provides only the involved persons of the second or of the third range in the corruption affair. The plot of the novel always seems incomplete. Traditionally, it appears in the form of a story about good and evil, where the final sanction has not been imposed on the perpetrator, and the real perpetrator has neither revealed nor sentenced. But it contains a statement and hinting most of the time that the perpetrator is always behind the curtain and disappears behind the scene of the trial. The question that always arises in these three issues is that these officials are essentially appointed; why did some senior officials appear in the trials but as witness, but later were removed from them. Note that there is a difference in the style of coverage between the Arabic newspapers and the Francophone newspapers. There are differences in boldness, clarity and statement, where *Alkhabar* newspaper has more ability to bold, the latter seems bolder in directing charges to sides accused of corruption, more inclined to politicize corruption, and that corruption is protected, there is no much difference in this style of charging between traditional newspapers and purely electronic newspapers. What is noticeable in the cases that have been disclosed is that the press coverage has not yielded significant political or informational results, and none of these three corruption scandals have led to direct accountability to any high official and have not led to the resignation of any high political personality either. Contrary to what is happening in other countries is known of its severity toward corruptions

In the course of the narrative construction, about corruption and the related charges (what is the charge?); Algerian national newspapers are trying to construct narrative of corruption and its event, by linking it with what official declaration reveals, and that the state organs are resolutely tackling corruption effectively. The political opposition's rhetoric made the responsibility of corruption over the state's high officials, and on weak and bad performance of the government. Even deepening this narrative, in order to give the impression that the principal perpetrator of corruption is the supreme officials of the State, and that the State has the capacity and intention to protect its corrupt agents, especially its officials from the ranks of Ministers, instead of that, it sacrificed only junior staff. The narratives of the traditional and online newspapers shown about corruption, is dominated by the character of the uncompleted story, by using the third pronouns. There is almost an absence of the direct reportages or the investigations where the journalists or newspapers play a key role in the story. The journalists stay outside the story and take heterodiegetic narrator position [2], and sometimes the narrative refer to use the macro-narrative in telling corruption histories. By telling how it is linked historically to the political regime and its authoritarian nature, it is part of the political and legitimacy crisis of the political system. Some of the articles dealing with

**110**

cases.

This study reveals that the role of journalism in fighting corruption in Algeria depends on the institutional and political context, where journalistic work remains very far from playing a key role in fighting corruption, and has no strong oversight role, unless it receives support from power factions or from one of the wings within ruling elite, which have an interest in leaking some information. On such a situation of the firm security strict security and political restraints, by legal and financial restrictions means on journalism work, and by indirect ways of controlling the mass media and daily newspapers, Throughout forbid allowing news releases of many corruption cases, under the pretext of security reasons and under pretext of law violation, concerning the inviolability of the reputation of persons, or that of moral persons and State institutions, under the charge of libel and spreading false news. This practice reflected the way how stories of corruption are reported in the online and traditional media alike, where it relies on re-narrating what others are saying about corruption, and the adoption of the official narration in the telling-story, which are characterized with mystery and lack of full elements and characters of the usual narration, and the incomplete full threads. Therefore, this kind of telling story about corruption, with poor unconvincing plot of the story, consolidates the reader's mistrust, and ordinary citizen's suspicion toward established political authority and ruling elite. This situation also strengthens the conviction that the actor in corruption cases remain always hidden behind the scene of the crime of corruption, and there is great protection for politicians and officials of the incumbency, so those peoples involved in corruption cases are only a scapegoats. Those

cases confirm theories concerning the mechanisms of narration of the journalistic work that transform news in fictional and fable narrative [45, 46] but without esthetic plot elements. In addition, the Algerian case confirms the hypothesis that journalism narrative on corruption reveals the relationship of power in this field. When the press writes about corruption cases, it does not mean fighting corruption necessarily, or to expose it or seek to investigate on it seriously, but only to tells partial and fragmented stories about corruption, and it does not provide a complete and convincing narrative, which is often the official and dominant version of corruption narrative. The media arena with its journalism narratives about corruption reflects in almost cases the power domination, where the press narrative rereproduces power and political dominance relationship. Especially when narratives and its structure shed light frequently on the trial process events, not on the crime scene itself, this lead to reconfirm that political authority of the incumbent power elite, has abilities to controls corruption issues, and also controls who is entitled to tell and narrate about corruption, and how to tell the story of corruption. Finally, in order to draw attention to marginalized narratives, the opposition press conveys different views about other political figures and parties, often in opposing side to reconstruct macro-narration and present only a vague story about corrupted ruling elite.

### **Author details**

Abdelkader Abdelali Political Science Department, Tahar Moulay University, Saida, Algeria

\*Address all correspondence to: abdelaliabk@gmail.com

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

**113**

2002-11

*Traditional and Online Journalism and Corruption Investigation Issues: The Case of Algeria*

[12] Chowdhury SK. The effect of democracy and press freedom on corruption: An empirical test. Economics Letters. 2004;**85**(1):93-101

[13] Jarso JF. The media and the anti-corruption crusade in Kenya: Weighing the achievements,

[14] Herman ES, Chomsky N.

2010;**26**:33

House; 2010

1973

2013

challenges, and prospects. American University International Law Review.

Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media. Random

[15] McChesney RW. The Political Economy of Media: Enduring Issues, Emerging Dilemmas. NYU Press; 2008

[16] Mosco V. The Political Economy of Communication: Rethinking and

[17] Herrick DF. Media Management in the Age of Giants: Business Dynamics of

[18] Schiller H. The Mind Managers.

[19] Schiller HI. Communication and

[20] Becker LB, Naab TK, English C, Vlad T. Measurement Issues and the Relationship Between Media Freedom and Corruption. Dublin: Journalism Research and Education Section, International Association for Media and Communication Research;

[21] Brunetti A, Weder B. A free press is bad news for corruption. Journal of Public Economics. 2003;**87**:1801-1824

[22] Stapenhurst R. The Media's Role in Curbing Corruption. Washington, DC:

World Bank Institute; 2000

Renewal. Vol. 13. Sage; 1996

Journalism. UNM Press; 2012

Cultural Domination. 1976;

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85925*

[1] Berg BL. Qualitative Research Methods for the Social Sciences. 4th ed. Boston: Allyn and Bacon; 2001.

[2] Berning N. Narrative Means to Journalistic Ends: A Narratological Analysis of Selected Journalistic Reportages. 1st ed. Wiesbaden: VS, Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften; 2011.

[3] Riessman CK. Narrative Methods for the Human Sciences. SAGE; 2008.

[4] Coronel S. Corruption and the watchdog role of the news media. In: Public Sentinel: News Media & Governance Reform. 2010. pp. 111-136

[5] Norris P. The role of the free press in promoting democratization, good governance and human development10.

[6] Peters B. The media's role: Covering or covering up corruption? Global Corruption. 2003;**2003**:44-56

[7] DeFleur ML. Theories of Mass

[8] Griffin EA. A First Look at Communication Theory. 8th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill; 2012. p. 1

[9] Hanitzsch T. Deconstructing journalism culture: Toward a universal theory. Communication Theory.

[10] Severin WJ, Tankard JW. Communication Theories: Origins, Methods, and Uses in the Mass Media.

Pearson College Division; 2001

[11] Ahrend R. Press Freedom, Human Capital and Corruption. DELTA (Ecole normale supérieure); 2002. Report No:

Matters. 2006;**45**(4-6):66

Communication. 1966;

2007;**17**(4):367-385

p. 158. (VS research)

**References**

p. 304

p. 265

*Traditional and Online Journalism and Corruption Investigation Issues: The Case of Algeria DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85925*

#### **References**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

cases confirm theories concerning the mechanisms of narration of the journalistic work that transform news in fictional and fable narrative [45, 46] but without esthetic plot elements. In addition, the Algerian case confirms the hypothesis that journalism narrative on corruption reveals the relationship of power in this field. When the press writes about corruption cases, it does not mean fighting corruption necessarily, or to expose it or seek to investigate on it seriously, but only to tells partial and fragmented stories about corruption, and it does not provide a complete and convincing narrative, which is often the official and dominant version of corruption narrative. The media arena with its journalism narratives about corruption

reflects in almost cases the power domination, where the press narrative re-

reproduces power and political dominance relationship. Especially when narratives and its structure shed light frequently on the trial process events, not on the crime scene itself, this lead to reconfirm that political authority of the incumbent power elite, has abilities to controls corruption issues, and also controls who is entitled to tell and narrate about corruption, and how to tell the story of corruption. Finally, in order to draw attention to marginalized narratives, the opposition press conveys different views about other political figures and parties, often in opposing side to reconstruct macro-narration and present only a vague story about corrupted ruling

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,

Political Science Department, Tahar Moulay University, Saida, Algeria

\*Address all correspondence to: abdelaliabk@gmail.com

**112**

**Author details**

Abdelkader Abdelali

elite.

provided the original work is properly cited.

[1] Berg BL. Qualitative Research Methods for the Social Sciences. 4th ed. Boston: Allyn and Bacon; 2001. p. 304

[2] Berning N. Narrative Means to Journalistic Ends: A Narratological Analysis of Selected Journalistic Reportages. 1st ed. Wiesbaden: VS, Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften; 2011. p. 158. (VS research)

[3] Riessman CK. Narrative Methods for the Human Sciences. SAGE; 2008. p. 265

[4] Coronel S. Corruption and the watchdog role of the news media. In: Public Sentinel: News Media & Governance Reform. 2010. pp. 111-136

[5] Norris P. The role of the free press in promoting democratization, good governance and human development10. Matters. 2006;**45**(4-6):66

[6] Peters B. The media's role: Covering or covering up corruption? Global Corruption. 2003;**2003**:44-56

[7] DeFleur ML. Theories of Mass Communication. 1966;

[8] Griffin EA. A First Look at Communication Theory. 8th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill; 2012. p. 1

[9] Hanitzsch T. Deconstructing journalism culture: Toward a universal theory. Communication Theory. 2007;**17**(4):367-385

[10] Severin WJ, Tankard JW. Communication Theories: Origins, Methods, and Uses in the Mass Media. Pearson College Division; 2001

[11] Ahrend R. Press Freedom, Human Capital and Corruption. DELTA (Ecole normale supérieure); 2002. Report No: 2002-11

[12] Chowdhury SK. The effect of democracy and press freedom on corruption: An empirical test. Economics Letters. 2004;**85**(1):93-101

[13] Jarso JF. The media and the anti-corruption crusade in Kenya: Weighing the achievements, challenges, and prospects. American University International Law Review. 2010;**26**:33

[14] Herman ES, Chomsky N. Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media. Random House; 2010

[15] McChesney RW. The Political Economy of Media: Enduring Issues, Emerging Dilemmas. NYU Press; 2008

[16] Mosco V. The Political Economy of Communication: Rethinking and Renewal. Vol. 13. Sage; 1996

[17] Herrick DF. Media Management in the Age of Giants: Business Dynamics of Journalism. UNM Press; 2012

[18] Schiller H. The Mind Managers. 1973

[19] Schiller HI. Communication and Cultural Domination. 1976;

[20] Becker LB, Naab TK, English C, Vlad T. Measurement Issues and the Relationship Between Media Freedom and Corruption. Dublin: Journalism Research and Education Section, International Association for Media and Communication Research; 2013

[21] Brunetti A, Weder B. A free press is bad news for corruption. Journal of Public Economics. 2003;**87**:1801-1824

[22] Stapenhurst R. The Media's Role in Curbing Corruption. Washington, DC: World Bank Institute; 2000

[23] Caiden GE. Curbing Corruption in Asian Countries: An Impossible Dream? Taylor & Francis; 2011

[24] Phiri I. Evolution of anti-corruption journalism in Africa: Lessons from Zambia. Global Media Journal. 2008;**2**(1):15-31

[25] Domingo D, Quandt T, Heinonen A, Paulussen S, Singer JB, Vujnovic M. Participatory journalism practices in the media and beyond: An international comparative study of initiatives in online newspapers. Journalism Practice. 2008;**2**(3):326-342

[26] Gupta A. Blurred boundaries: The discourse of corruption, the culture of politics, and the imagined state. American Ethnologist. 1995;**22**(2):375-402

[27] Gupta A. Narratives of corruption: Anthropological and fictional accounts of the Indian state. Ethnography. 2005;**6**(1):5-34

[28] De Burgh H. Kings without crowns? The re-emergence of investigative journalism in China. Media, Culture and Society. 2003;**25**(6):801-820

[29] Hsu CL. Political narratives and the production of legitimacy: The case of corruption in post-Mao China. Qualitative Sociology. 2001;**24**(1):25-54

[30] Bebawi S. Investigative Journalism in the Arab World [Internet]. London: Palgrave Macmillan UK; 2016. Available from: http://link.springer. com/10.1057/9781137461049 [Accessed: 11 October 2018]

[31] Pintak L, Ginges J. Arab journalists. In: Weaver DH, Willnat L, editors. The Global Journalist in the 21st Century. New York: Routledge; 2012. pp. 249-442. (Routledge communication series)

[32] Freedom House. Algeria Profile [Internet]. Freedom House. 2018. Available from: https://freedomhouse. org/report/freedom-world/2018/algeria [Accessed: 06 October 2018]

[33] Reporters without borders. Algeria: Press freedom under threat | Reporters without borders [Internet]. Reporters without borders. 2018. Available from: https://rsf.org/en/algeria [Accessed: 06 October 2018]

[34] Transparency International— Algeria [Internet]. Available from: https://www.transparency.org/country/ DZA [Accessed: 06 October 2018]

[35] Hadjadj D. Country report: Algeria. In: Global Corruption Report: 2006. London: Pluto Press; 2006. pp. 123-126. (Global corruption report)

[36] Boudhane Y. Espace Public Mediatique en Algerie: A la Recherche d'un Modele. Communication and Development. 2012;**128**(546):1-42

[37] Croll A, Ould Tayeb N. Presse gouvernementale et presse dite «indépendante» en Algérie: Quelles différences? Mots. Les Langages du Politique. 1998;**57**(1):72-89

[38] El-Issawi F. Algerian National Media: Freedom at a Cost. 2017;

[39] Dris C. Algérie 2016: Révision constitutionnelle sur fond de normalisation de l'impunité. L'Année du Maghreb. 2017;**17**:245-256

[40] Dris C. La nouvelle loi organique sur l'information de 2012 en Algérie: vers un ordre médiatique néo-autoritaire? L'Année du Maghreb. 2012;**VIII**:303-320

[41] Mostefaoui B. Note sur la régulation des médias en Algérie. L'Année du Maghreb. 2016;**15**:25-28

[42] Aldjia B. Les sources anonymes et la fragilisation de l'espace public médiatique en Algérie. Algerian Journal of Security and Development. 2014;**4**(1):260-270

**115**

*Traditional and Online Journalism and Corruption Investigation Issues: The Case of Algeria*

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85925*

Algeria. In: Transparency International, editor. Global Corruption Report 2005: Transparency International. 1. Aufl. London: Pluto Press; 2005. pp. 143-145. (Global Corruption Report:

[43] Hadjadj D. Country reposrt:

Transparency International)

[Accessed: 11 October 2018]

1994. p. 292

[44] Algeria, Freedom in the World 2015 [Internet]. Freedom House. 2015. Available from: https://freedomhouse. org/report/freedom-world/2015/algeria

[45] Frus P. The Politics and Poetics of Journalistic Narrative: The Timely and the Timeless. Cambridge [England]; New York: Cambridge University Press;

[46] Hellmann J. Fables of Fact: The New Journalism as New Fiction. Urbana: University of Illinois Press; 1981. p. 164

*Traditional and Online Journalism and Corruption Investigation Issues: The Case of Algeria DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85925*

[43] Hadjadj D. Country reposrt: Algeria. In: Transparency International, editor. Global Corruption Report 2005: Transparency International. 1. Aufl. London: Pluto Press; 2005. pp. 143-145. (Global Corruption Report: Transparency International)

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

org/report/freedom-world/2018/algeria

[33] Reporters without borders. Algeria: Press freedom under threat | Reporters without borders [Internet]. Reporters without borders. 2018. Available from: https://rsf.org/en/algeria [Accessed:

[34] Transparency International— Algeria [Internet]. Available from: https://www.transparency.org/country/ DZA [Accessed: 06 October 2018]

(Global corruption report)

[36] Boudhane Y. Espace Public Mediatique en Algerie: A la Recherche d'un Modele. Communication and Development. 2012;**128**(546):1-42

[37] Croll A, Ould Tayeb N. Presse gouvernementale et presse dite «indépendante» en Algérie: Quelles différences? Mots. Les Langages du

[38] El-Issawi F. Algerian National Media: Freedom at a Cost. 2017;

[39] Dris C. Algérie 2016: Révision constitutionnelle sur fond de

normalisation de l'impunité. L'Année du

[40] Dris C. La nouvelle loi organique sur l'information de 2012 en Algérie: vers un ordre médiatique néo-autoritaire? L'Année du Maghreb. 2012;**VIII**:303-320

[41] Mostefaoui B. Note sur la régulation des médias en Algérie. L'Année du

[42] Aldjia B. Les sources anonymes et la fragilisation de l'espace public médiatique en Algérie. Algerian Journal of Security and Development.

Politique. 1998;**57**(1):72-89

Maghreb. 2017;**17**:245-256

Maghreb. 2016;**15**:25-28

2014;**4**(1):260-270

[35] Hadjadj D. Country report: Algeria. In: Global Corruption Report: 2006. London: Pluto Press; 2006. pp. 123-126.

[Accessed: 06 October 2018]

06 October 2018]

[23] Caiden GE. Curbing Corruption in Asian Countries: An Impossible Dream?

[24] Phiri I. Evolution of anti-corruption journalism in Africa: Lessons from Zambia. Global Media Journal.

[25] Domingo D, Quandt T, Heinonen A, Paulussen S, Singer JB, Vujnovic M. Participatory journalism practices in the media and beyond: An international comparative study of initiatives in online newspapers. Journalism Practice.

[26] Gupta A. Blurred boundaries: The discourse of corruption, the culture of politics, and the imagined state. American

[27] Gupta A. Narratives of corruption: Anthropological and fictional accounts of the Indian state. Ethnography.

[28] De Burgh H. Kings without crowns? The re-emergence of investigative journalism in China. Media, Culture and

[29] Hsu CL. Political narratives and the production of legitimacy: The case of corruption in post-Mao China. Qualitative Sociology. 2001;**24**(1):25-54

[30] Bebawi S. Investigative Journalism in the Arab World [Internet]. London:

[31] Pintak L, Ginges J. Arab journalists. In: Weaver DH, Willnat L, editors. The Global Journalist in the 21st Century. New York: Routledge; 2012. pp. 249-442. (Routledge communication series)

[32] Freedom House. Algeria Profile [Internet]. Freedom House. 2018. Available from: https://freedomhouse.

Palgrave Macmillan UK; 2016. Available from: http://link.springer. com/10.1057/9781137461049 [Accessed:

11 October 2018]

Ethnologist. 1995;**22**(2):375-402

Society. 2003;**25**(6):801-820

Taylor & Francis; 2011

2008;**2**(1):15-31

2008;**2**(3):326-342

2005;**6**(1):5-34

**114**

[44] Algeria, Freedom in the World 2015 [Internet]. Freedom House. 2015. Available from: https://freedomhouse. org/report/freedom-world/2015/algeria [Accessed: 11 October 2018]

[45] Frus P. The Politics and Poetics of Journalistic Narrative: The Timely and the Timeless. Cambridge [England]; New York: Cambridge University Press; 1994. p. 292

[46] Hellmann J. Fables of Fact: The New Journalism as New Fiction. Urbana: University of Illinois Press; 1981. p. 164

**117**

Section 2

Integration of Traditional

with New Journalism -

Opportunities and Threats

### Section 2

## Integration of Traditional with New Journalism - Opportunities and Threats

**119**

**Chapter 7**

**Abstract**

Explored

user-generated content

**1. Introduction**

Do Independent Arab YouTube

Themselves"? The Saudi Case

The chapter discusses whether YouTube empowers professional amateurs (Pro-Ams) to build the agenda of their channels independently. It also explores the development of YouTube from being a user-dominated platform into an institutionalized medium in its post-Google era. In-depth interviews were conducted with a group of 19-Pro-Ams in Saudi Arabia, representing two YouTube video-producing companies to explore the business model of their channels, how they feel empowered, and how their work is affected by culture, business, and politics. Attempting to reinterview them after 4 years, only one respondent agreed to participate. The results show that the leading YouTube channels in Saudi Arabia attract millions of views monthly. The business model of the channels shows that they are run in a semiprofessional style by using personal and advertising funding. The Pro-Ams feel empowered thanks to the routine-free, low cost, and easy-to-use popular platform. They launched their channels to "broadcast" themselves, but with the professionalization and monetization, they had to accommodate the agenda of the audience, the advertisers, and the regime. Eventually, the model was either discontinued or reduced to be an advertising/entrainment platform. The lack of regulations has been always a challenge for these Pro-Ams to get licensed and have a legal standing.

**Keywords:** YouTube channels, Saudi Arabia, Pro-Ams, user empowerment,

age of 110 per capita views for just one channel. In 2013, more than 90

According to Matt Smith from Reuters, Saudi Arabia is "the biggest user of YouTube per capita in the world [1]." As of January 2015, the independent Saudi YouTube channel *Sa7i* has attracted more than 313 million views [2], with an aver-

million videos were watched daily in Saudi Arabia, which were higher than any daily viewership of YouTube videos in any other country [3]. This translates into an average of each inhabitant watching more than three YouTube videos daily. These numbers indicate that these inhabitants seek on YouTube what they cannot find on free-to-air terrestrial and satellite channels. These statistics also underscore several pertinent aspects of the use of YouTube. First, YouTube captures the biggest share

Broadcasters "Broadcast

*Hesham Mesbah and Nasser Almujaibel*

#### **Chapter 7**

## Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored

*Hesham Mesbah and Nasser Almujaibel*

### **Abstract**

The chapter discusses whether YouTube empowers professional amateurs (Pro-Ams) to build the agenda of their channels independently. It also explores the development of YouTube from being a user-dominated platform into an institutionalized medium in its post-Google era. In-depth interviews were conducted with a group of 19-Pro-Ams in Saudi Arabia, representing two YouTube video-producing companies to explore the business model of their channels, how they feel empowered, and how their work is affected by culture, business, and politics. Attempting to reinterview them after 4 years, only one respondent agreed to participate. The results show that the leading YouTube channels in Saudi Arabia attract millions of views monthly. The business model of the channels shows that they are run in a semiprofessional style by using personal and advertising funding. The Pro-Ams feel empowered thanks to the routine-free, low cost, and easy-to-use popular platform. They launched their channels to "broadcast" themselves, but with the professionalization and monetization, they had to accommodate the agenda of the audience, the advertisers, and the regime. Eventually, the model was either discontinued or reduced to be an advertising/entrainment platform. The lack of regulations has been always a challenge for these Pro-Ams to get licensed and have a legal standing.

**Keywords:** YouTube channels, Saudi Arabia, Pro-Ams, user empowerment, user-generated content

#### **1. Introduction**

According to Matt Smith from Reuters, Saudi Arabia is "the biggest user of YouTube per capita in the world [1]." As of January 2015, the independent Saudi YouTube channel *Sa7i* has attracted more than 313 million views [2], with an average of 110 per capita views for just one channel. In 2013, more than 90 million videos were watched daily in Saudi Arabia, which were higher than any daily viewership of YouTube videos in any other country [3]. This translates into an average of each inhabitant watching more than three YouTube videos daily. These numbers indicate that these inhabitants seek on YouTube what they cannot find on free-to-air terrestrial and satellite channels. These statistics also underscore several pertinent aspects of the use of YouTube. First, YouTube captures the biggest share

of media audiences in some parts of the world, including Saudi Arabia. Second, YouTube provides an alternative outlet for its users to release their creativity and share it with massive audiences. Third, the use of YouTube by professional amateurs (Pro-Ams) in Saudi Arabia is a special case that is worthy of exploring. This growth of "independent broadcasting" in a long-time central, authoritarian country is not expected to be either encouraged or welcomed by the authorities.

The present study investigates the aspects and development of YouTube channels in Saudi Arabia by conducting in-depth interviews with a sample of Saudi YouTube broadcasters over the span of 3 years. This study also examines the business model of the leading YouTube channels in Saudi Arabia and how these young Pro-Ams chose and communicated their content. Finally, this study explores whether YouTube empowers these YouTube broadcasters to broadcast themselves or exposes them to a constant scrutiny from the authority.

#### **2. YouTube: an empowering medium**

YouTube has revolutionized televised mass communication since its launch in 2005. Simply put, it has turned mass communication from an organizational process into an individual initiative. The founders of the company have perfectly highlighted the democratizing power of YouTube in its slogan: "Broadcast Yourself." As PayPal employees, the creators of YouTube originally designed it as a platform for users to upload videos and provide additional content for eBay or share home videos [4]. YouTube users, however, "hijacked" the site by posting their own content and linking their posts to other social networking activities [5]. From then on, YouTube users have engaged in "mass self-communication [6]," wherein they can actively perform the role of the sender in the model of broadcasting communication, rather than merely being passive receivers mesmerized in front of the boob tube. The attractiveness of YouTube in its first year was not based on the quality of the videos uploaded, but rather on the empowering aspect of how it functioned. Ordinary users, with the help of a simple technology, could be their own camera operators, editors, producers, broadcasters, and media critics. YouTube liberated citizens to "broadcast themselves" and express their political orientations, religious beliefs, professional affiliations, and entertainment preferences. The amateur narrowcasters formed their own channels and networks on this user-dominated platform. According to Grusin, YouTube became the "remediation of television in the world of networked publics [7]." YouTube was classified as an "activity-focused site" [8] that presents user-generated content and allows for social networking. This opened the gate for the emergence of YouTube celebrities, such as Felix Kjellberg (known as PewDiePie on YouTube) who has garnered more than 70 million subscribers and scored 19 billion video views as of November 2018. In a survey conducted by Variety [9], teens considered YouTube celebrities as more authentic and approachable than mainstream celebrities.

The anarchic environment of narrowcasting on YouTube became more regulated after Google purchased the site in 2006 for \$1.65 billion in stocks. The amateurish nature of the network began to acquire professional features with the legalization and commercialization processes that ensued. Media conglomerates wanted to preserve their copyrights, establish a YouTube outlet for their programming, and enhance their advertising revenues. Networks and cable sought to tame this new arena through enforcing the traditional rules of the game [10]. These media conglomerates identified two advantages for streaming video online: "retransmission of channels and interactivity-based advertisements [11]." YouTube began to play banner advertisements during video streaming [12], and the ad revenue is split between

**121**

video streaming market [20].

*Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored*

YouTube and the video provider or copyright owners [13]. Kim calls the evolvement of YouTube from personal, to public, and finally to commercial as the "the road to institutionalization [11]." This institutionalization and encroachment of giant media corporations on YouTube have been expected to limit its revolutionary, liberating nature. For instance, the application of copyright regulations "weakens the reliability of YouTube as a stable online library… while advertising factors limit the genre of clips on YouTube [11]." Dylko et al. cautioned that "elite voices" would still dominate in the post-Google era of YouTube [14]. Dylko and his coauthors examined whether the news posted on YouTube came from elite online media, such as celebrities, political figures, and well-funded organization, or non-elite groups. They found that most of the political videos posted came from elite sources, as 56% of the content in videos came from traditional media. Dylko et al.'s study demonstrated the dominance of traditional media over the political content on YouTube in the 6 months prior to the American presidential election in 2008. Their results agree with Bakker's content analysis study of a sample of Dutch political blogs, which found that bloggers relied mainly on mainstream news media for content [15]. Bakker concluded that the relationship between politics, journalists, and citizens has remained unchanged, as "elite" news sources continue to dominate the dissemi-

nation of news and set the news agenda, both online and offline.

TV channels have also responded to the threat of losing their dominance over the market of entertainment by "offering their content on sites of their own or on joint sites such as Hulu [16]." Bergström [17] reported that UGC is more entertainment than news. Currently, YouTube offers full-length movies in different languages, as well as full episodes of television shows [17]. The networks have also developed a strategy of producing video content specifically for online distribution. The storyline of these video teasers are about successful TV shows, such as *American Idol* or the *Office*, or new properties generated for online distribution, such as ABC's *Squeegees* and NBC's *Gemini Division* [18]. Kim identified the entertainment capabilities of YouTube as a "stepping stone" for mainstream media, in which they have created a new format called a "Webisode," or a 3–5-minute episode produced for online viewing to promote TV shows [11]. Simonsen [19] notes that film and music producers, politicians, and TV stations use two strategies to distribute their videos online: primary or secondary distributions. Primary distribution encompasses videos produced exclusively for online viewing, whereas secondary distribution includes content that has been primarily produced for viewing through traditional media platforms [19]. Media companies came to quickly dominate the market of online entertainment. In December 2016, Netflix captured a share of 75% of the

Another aspect that limits the revolutionary aurora that initially surrounded YouTube is the professionalization of the entertainment content on the site. In the pre-Google era, it was amateurs who popularized YouTube as a video-sharing site. YouTube amateur Ryan Douthit, for example, managed to establish a thriving sports YouTube channel and made a significant profit via advertising revenue. The tide started to turn against him and thousands of other amateurs, however, as YouTube transformed from user-generated clips to professional content in the post-Google era. According to Shih from Reuters [21], many big-name talents, such as Tom Hanks and Amy Poehler, are backing YouTube projects. This influx of cash and celebrity "had left small "YouTubers" feeling alienated and shunted down [21]." YouTube seemed to be empowering the mainstream traditional media, advertisers,

Not only did YouTube empower media companies to extend their reach, but it also enabled them to induce users to reproduce their TV production. Some media companies create the same video in different versions with different bandwidths to

and celebrities, enhancing their gains, and extending their reach.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

#### *Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

YouTube and the video provider or copyright owners [13]. Kim calls the evolvement of YouTube from personal, to public, and finally to commercial as the "the road to institutionalization [11]." This institutionalization and encroachment of giant media corporations on YouTube have been expected to limit its revolutionary, liberating nature. For instance, the application of copyright regulations "weakens the reliability of YouTube as a stable online library… while advertising factors limit the genre of clips on YouTube [11]." Dylko et al. cautioned that "elite voices" would still dominate in the post-Google era of YouTube [14]. Dylko and his coauthors examined whether the news posted on YouTube came from elite online media, such as celebrities, political figures, and well-funded organization, or non-elite groups. They found that most of the political videos posted came from elite sources, as 56% of the content in videos came from traditional media. Dylko et al.'s study demonstrated the dominance of traditional media over the political content on YouTube in the 6 months prior to the American presidential election in 2008. Their results agree with Bakker's content analysis study of a sample of Dutch political blogs, which found that bloggers relied mainly on mainstream news media for content [15]. Bakker concluded that the relationship between politics, journalists, and citizens has remained unchanged, as "elite" news sources continue to dominate the dissemination of news and set the news agenda, both online and offline.

TV channels have also responded to the threat of losing their dominance over the market of entertainment by "offering their content on sites of their own or on joint sites such as Hulu [16]." Bergström [17] reported that UGC is more entertainment than news. Currently, YouTube offers full-length movies in different languages, as well as full episodes of television shows [17]. The networks have also developed a strategy of producing video content specifically for online distribution. The storyline of these video teasers are about successful TV shows, such as *American Idol* or the *Office*, or new properties generated for online distribution, such as ABC's *Squeegees* and NBC's *Gemini Division* [18]. Kim identified the entertainment capabilities of YouTube as a "stepping stone" for mainstream media, in which they have created a new format called a "Webisode," or a 3–5-minute episode produced for online viewing to promote TV shows [11]. Simonsen [19] notes that film and music producers, politicians, and TV stations use two strategies to distribute their videos online: primary or secondary distributions. Primary distribution encompasses videos produced exclusively for online viewing, whereas secondary distribution includes content that has been primarily produced for viewing through traditional media platforms [19]. Media companies came to quickly dominate the market of online entertainment. In December 2016, Netflix captured a share of 75% of the video streaming market [20].

Another aspect that limits the revolutionary aurora that initially surrounded YouTube is the professionalization of the entertainment content on the site. In the pre-Google era, it was amateurs who popularized YouTube as a video-sharing site. YouTube amateur Ryan Douthit, for example, managed to establish a thriving sports YouTube channel and made a significant profit via advertising revenue. The tide started to turn against him and thousands of other amateurs, however, as YouTube transformed from user-generated clips to professional content in the post-Google era. According to Shih from Reuters [21], many big-name talents, such as Tom Hanks and Amy Poehler, are backing YouTube projects. This influx of cash and celebrity "had left small "YouTubers" feeling alienated and shunted down [21]." YouTube seemed to be empowering the mainstream traditional media, advertisers, and celebrities, enhancing their gains, and extending their reach.

Not only did YouTube empower media companies to extend their reach, but it also enabled them to induce users to reproduce their TV production. Some media companies create the same video in different versions with different bandwidths to

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

expected to be either encouraged or welcomed by the authorities.

exposes them to a constant scrutiny from the authority.

**2. YouTube: an empowering medium**

of media audiences in some parts of the world, including Saudi Arabia. Second, YouTube provides an alternative outlet for its users to release their creativity and share it with massive audiences. Third, the use of YouTube by professional amateurs (Pro-Ams) in Saudi Arabia is a special case that is worthy of exploring. This growth of "independent broadcasting" in a long-time central, authoritarian country is not

The present study investigates the aspects and development of YouTube channels in Saudi Arabia by conducting in-depth interviews with a sample of Saudi YouTube broadcasters over the span of 3 years. This study also examines the business model of the leading YouTube channels in Saudi Arabia and how these young Pro-Ams chose and communicated their content. Finally, this study explores whether YouTube empowers these YouTube broadcasters to broadcast themselves or

YouTube has revolutionized televised mass communication since its launch in 2005. Simply put, it has turned mass communication from an organizational process into an individual initiative. The founders of the company have perfectly highlighted the democratizing power of YouTube in its slogan: "Broadcast Yourself." As PayPal employees, the creators of YouTube originally designed it as a platform for users to upload videos and provide additional content for eBay or share home videos [4]. YouTube users, however, "hijacked" the site by posting their own content and linking their posts to other social networking activities [5]. From then on, YouTube users have engaged in "mass self-communication [6]," wherein they can actively perform the role of the sender in the model of broadcasting communication, rather than merely being passive receivers mesmerized in front of the boob tube. The attractiveness of YouTube in its first year was not based on the quality of the videos uploaded, but rather on the empowering aspect of how it functioned. Ordinary users, with the help of a simple technology, could be their own camera operators, editors, producers, broadcasters, and media critics. YouTube liberated citizens to "broadcast themselves" and express their political orientations, religious beliefs, professional affiliations, and entertainment preferences. The amateur narrowcasters formed their own channels and networks on this user-dominated platform. According to Grusin, YouTube became the "remediation of television in the world of networked publics [7]." YouTube was classified as an "activity-focused site" [8] that presents user-generated content and allows for social networking. This opened the gate for the emergence of YouTube celebrities, such as Felix Kjellberg (known as PewDiePie on YouTube) who has garnered more than 70 million subscribers and scored 19 billion video views as of November 2018. In a survey conducted by Variety [9], teens considered YouTube celebrities as more authentic and approachable than

The anarchic environment of narrowcasting on YouTube became more regulated after Google purchased the site in 2006 for \$1.65 billion in stocks. The amateurish nature of the network began to acquire professional features with the legalization and commercialization processes that ensued. Media conglomerates wanted to preserve their copyrights, establish a YouTube outlet for their programming, and enhance their advertising revenues. Networks and cable sought to tame this new arena through enforcing the traditional rules of the game [10]. These media conglomerates identified two advantages for streaming video online: "retransmission of channels and interactivity-based advertisements [11]." YouTube began to play banner advertisements during video streaming [12], and the ad revenue is split between

**120**

mainstream celebrities.

accommodate the diversity of the streaming bandwidth in the world and ease the reposting of their videos. This leads to the existence of identical versions of a single video, what is called "content aliasing" [22]. YouTube users are therefore turned into "prosumers" or "peer producers" [23]. In his doctoral dissertation, Kim refuted the perspective of "user empowerment" and described it as a myth [24]. He suggested that the participation of YouTube users in reproducing materials is misleadingly conceptualized as user empowerment. He further argued that YouTube users represent a "cybernetic commodity" for media companies that utilize their demographic and biometric information for marketing benefits. YouTube users, according to Kim, selectively consume cultural commodities, but do not necessarily participate in the political or social life. The users, according to Kim, "know, but they do not act [24]." For Kim, therefore, involvement and power sharing are not identical.

Nonetheless, YouTube remains a liberating platform for citizen journalists and amateur entertainers. That the main producers of news and entertainment content on YouTube are mainstream media and major political parties does not negate the reality that YouTube is an open platform that welcomes amateur contributors around the clock. The term "platform" connotes availability, openness, and interactivity. For others, a platform "facilitates user expression [22]." For Miller, this makes YouTube "a form of participatory culture [25]." The culture of participation and personal interaction explains why YouTube has worked so well [26]. Regardless of the content YouTube users decide to upload, they participate in producing or reproducing culture, rather than merely consuming it. Every uploaded video is an indication of a user's taste in culture, beliefs, and even sense of humor [4].

A body of research has recently provided empirical evidence showing that using social media for social interactions fosters political expression and political participation [27–29]. For Grönlund [30], online participation is a three-step ladder, the first step of which is e-Enabling, or giving access and information to participants. The second step is e-Engaging, wherein users interact and start a dialog. The top and final step of online participation is e-Empowering, or when users work together and acquire tasks to collaborate with organizations or political bodies [30]. According to Grönlund's model, online participation is not an all-or-none process, but rather a continuum that proceeds through time, practice, and engagement. At the end of the continuum, empowerment occurs. Accordingly, other authors, such as Gauntlett [31], Miles [32], and Soukup [26] suggest that YouTube fosters communities, as it encourages users to do more than just video-share. The users can link to other social networks and blogs, which gives YouTube the distinctive feature of expanded social connection [33]. Users can also make comments, give star ratings, add friends, send messages, and make videos in response to other videos [31]. In addition, users can also rate others' comments by using thumbs-up and thumbs-down buttons [34]. To Lange, the feature of commenting has a high premium—she suggested that this feature is a "crucial part of YouTube participation and social interaction [35]." The empowerment did not go unnoticed by authorities. In a survey study that used a sample of Canadian front-line police officers, most of those officers recognized the video-recorded documentation and social media dissemination of their actions as a "disciplining influence on their consciousness as they perform police work and as a significant deterrent against use of force misconduct [36]."

Building on this sense of empowerment, online participation has developed into cyber activism, as epitomized in the series of uprisings known as the Arab Spring that swept over five Arab countries, starting with Tunisia in 2010. Political activists used YouTube to show what state TV and private satellite stations were ignoring or concealing. Khalid Said, a young Egyptian blogger, posted a video on YouTube showing a group of police officers sharing confiscated drugs. In retaliation, two secret policemen attacked Said, resulting in his death. The police reported that Said

**123**

*Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored*

tried to swallow a packet of drugs and had choked to death—however, a photo of Said with a bruised and bloodied face went viral on social media after his death, and a Facebook page created for Said attracted more than two million followers. In response to these events, those social media users chose January 25 as the day of showing anger—and this day would begin The Egyptian Spring. Howard reported an Egyptian activist as saying, "we use Facebook to schedule the protests, Twitter to

YouTube has even empowered minor political groups and small parties to be more vocal and have a wider reach. Emruli and his coauthors found that candidates with little funding in Macedonia were able to reach young voters through entertaining visual means on YouTube [38]. They also found that nine out of 13 political parties had official YouTube channels. In Malaysia, YouTube videos "were a popular choice for the competing parties to reach out to the voting public [39]" during the Parliamentary election of 2016. Being aware of its political communication potential, YouTube has launched a *YouTube for Government* page to offer helpful tips for nation states to boost their profile and communicate more effectively with their

Knowledge in itself is an empowering tool. Kim argues that YouTube users might know but do not necessarily act upon their knowledge. He supports his argument with the hypothesis of narcotizing dysfunction of mass media coined by Lazarsfeld and Merton in the 1940s [24]. However, there is no empirical evidence showing a narcotizing dysfunction of social media that provides a totally different environment and communication model compared to traditional media. To the contrary, it is argued that a monopoly of knowledge is "the main reason for the failure of the enlightenment project [40]." Information technology has "revived pedagogically participatory democracy [40]." YouTube has broken the monopoly of political and social knowledge imposed by news media in the West and totalitarian, repressive

The professionalization of YouTube did not completely stop empowering amateur users, as it compelled them to acquire new skills and develop new ideas to move toward professionalism. Those generators of content on YouTube have moved from producing and consuming content on YouTube individually (procumers) into producing content as a teamwork at an organizational level, which moves them into an area between amateurism and professionalism. According to Bosshart and Schoenhagen [41], media amateurs/citizen journalists are those who either contribute content to mass media by submitting images and posting comments on news media websites, or those who generate content outside of news media websites without any "involvement of professional journalists" (p. 139). Operating a YouTube channel is hardly a profession that has "institutional and ideological traits more or less in common" [42], yet it bears some of the professional characteristics identified by the theory of professionalism attributes, such as having "a specialized technique … and a considerable autonomy to conduct their work" [43]. Accordingly, a hybrid of professional amateurs, or Pro-Ams, has begun to emerge on YouTube. They produce and upload video on YouTube from their homes to make a living. Dijck sees this convergence between usage and production as a source of empowerment for YouTube users [44]. Pro-Ams had a significant presence in the Arab World after the Arab Spring began. As an example, two young Egyptian activists started their political YouTube channel (Joe Tube) in January 2013 from their Cairo home to criticize the ruling military regime in Egypt. In less than a year, the channel scored more than 100 million views and more than 1.3 million subscribers. Another Egyptian satirist, Bassem Yousef, started his YouTube channel in 2011. He adopted the format of Jon Stewart of *The Daily Show*. Yousef's show gained tremendous popularity and was later turned into a weekly show on MBC—one of the leading Arab

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

coordinate, and YouTube to tell the world [37]."

target audiences.

regimes in other parts of the world.

#### *Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

tried to swallow a packet of drugs and had choked to death—however, a photo of Said with a bruised and bloodied face went viral on social media after his death, and a Facebook page created for Said attracted more than two million followers. In response to these events, those social media users chose January 25 as the day of showing anger—and this day would begin The Egyptian Spring. Howard reported an Egyptian activist as saying, "we use Facebook to schedule the protests, Twitter to coordinate, and YouTube to tell the world [37]."

YouTube has even empowered minor political groups and small parties to be more vocal and have a wider reach. Emruli and his coauthors found that candidates with little funding in Macedonia were able to reach young voters through entertaining visual means on YouTube [38]. They also found that nine out of 13 political parties had official YouTube channels. In Malaysia, YouTube videos "were a popular choice for the competing parties to reach out to the voting public [39]" during the Parliamentary election of 2016. Being aware of its political communication potential, YouTube has launched a *YouTube for Government* page to offer helpful tips for nation states to boost their profile and communicate more effectively with their target audiences.

Knowledge in itself is an empowering tool. Kim argues that YouTube users might know but do not necessarily act upon their knowledge. He supports his argument with the hypothesis of narcotizing dysfunction of mass media coined by Lazarsfeld and Merton in the 1940s [24]. However, there is no empirical evidence showing a narcotizing dysfunction of social media that provides a totally different environment and communication model compared to traditional media. To the contrary, it is argued that a monopoly of knowledge is "the main reason for the failure of the enlightenment project [40]." Information technology has "revived pedagogically participatory democracy [40]." YouTube has broken the monopoly of political and social knowledge imposed by news media in the West and totalitarian, repressive regimes in other parts of the world.

The professionalization of YouTube did not completely stop empowering amateur users, as it compelled them to acquire new skills and develop new ideas to move toward professionalism. Those generators of content on YouTube have moved from producing and consuming content on YouTube individually (procumers) into producing content as a teamwork at an organizational level, which moves them into an area between amateurism and professionalism. According to Bosshart and Schoenhagen [41], media amateurs/citizen journalists are those who either contribute content to mass media by submitting images and posting comments on news media websites, or those who generate content outside of news media websites without any "involvement of professional journalists" (p. 139). Operating a YouTube channel is hardly a profession that has "institutional and ideological traits more or less in common" [42], yet it bears some of the professional characteristics identified by the theory of professionalism attributes, such as having "a specialized technique … and a considerable autonomy to conduct their work" [43]. Accordingly, a hybrid of professional amateurs, or Pro-Ams, has begun to emerge on YouTube. They produce and upload video on YouTube from their homes to make a living. Dijck sees this convergence between usage and production as a source of empowerment for YouTube users [44]. Pro-Ams had a significant presence in the Arab World after the Arab Spring began. As an example, two young Egyptian activists started their political YouTube channel (Joe Tube) in January 2013 from their Cairo home to criticize the ruling military regime in Egypt. In less than a year, the channel scored more than 100 million views and more than 1.3 million subscribers. Another Egyptian satirist, Bassem Yousef, started his YouTube channel in 2011. He adopted the format of Jon Stewart of *The Daily Show*. Yousef's show gained tremendous popularity and was later turned into a weekly show on MBC—one of the leading Arab

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

accommodate the diversity of the streaming bandwidth in the world and ease the reposting of their videos. This leads to the existence of identical versions of a single video, what is called "content aliasing" [22]. YouTube users are therefore turned into "prosumers" or "peer producers" [23]. In his doctoral dissertation, Kim refuted the perspective of "user empowerment" and described it as a myth [24]. He suggested that the participation of YouTube users in reproducing materials is misleadingly conceptualized as user empowerment. He further argued that YouTube users represent a "cybernetic commodity" for media companies that utilize their demographic and biometric information for marketing benefits. YouTube users, according to Kim, selectively consume cultural commodities, but do not necessarily participate in the political or social life. The users, according to Kim, "know, but they do not act

[24]." For Kim, therefore, involvement and power sharing are not identical.

indication of a user's taste in culture, beliefs, and even sense of humor [4].

significant deterrent against use of force misconduct [36]."

Nonetheless, YouTube remains a liberating platform for citizen journalists and amateur entertainers. That the main producers of news and entertainment content on YouTube are mainstream media and major political parties does not negate the reality that YouTube is an open platform that welcomes amateur contributors around the clock. The term "platform" connotes availability, openness, and interactivity. For others, a platform "facilitates user expression [22]." For Miller, this makes YouTube "a form of participatory culture [25]." The culture of participation and personal interaction explains why YouTube has worked so well [26]. Regardless of the content YouTube users decide to upload, they participate in producing or reproducing culture, rather than merely consuming it. Every uploaded video is an

A body of research has recently provided empirical evidence showing that using social media for social interactions fosters political expression and political participation [27–29]. For Grönlund [30], online participation is a three-step ladder, the first step of which is e-Enabling, or giving access and information to participants. The second step is e-Engaging, wherein users interact and start a dialog. The top and final step of online participation is e-Empowering, or when users work together and acquire tasks to collaborate with organizations or political bodies [30]. According to Grönlund's model, online participation is not an all-or-none process, but rather a continuum that proceeds through time, practice, and engagement. At the end of the continuum, empowerment occurs. Accordingly, other authors, such as Gauntlett [31], Miles [32], and Soukup [26] suggest that YouTube fosters communities, as it encourages users to do more than just video-share. The users can link to other social networks and blogs, which gives YouTube the distinctive feature of expanded social connection [33]. Users can also make comments, give star ratings, add friends, send messages, and make videos in response to other videos [31]. In addition, users can also rate others' comments by using thumbs-up and thumbs-down buttons [34]. To Lange, the feature of commenting has a high premium—she suggested that this feature is a "crucial part of YouTube participation and social interaction [35]." The empowerment did not go unnoticed by authorities. In a survey study that used a sample of Canadian front-line police officers, most of those officers recognized the video-recorded documentation and social media dissemination of their actions as a "disciplining influence on their consciousness as they perform police work and as a

Building on this sense of empowerment, online participation has developed into cyber activism, as epitomized in the series of uprisings known as the Arab Spring that swept over five Arab countries, starting with Tunisia in 2010. Political activists used YouTube to show what state TV and private satellite stations were ignoring or concealing. Khalid Said, a young Egyptian blogger, posted a video on YouTube showing a group of police officers sharing confiscated drugs. In retaliation, two secret policemen attacked Said, resulting in his death. The police reported that Said

**122**

media networks. Moving from YouTube to free airwaves, former Pro-Am Yousef turned into a full-fledged professional TV celebrity. However, the military regime in Egypt felt uncomfortable about the satiric tone of Yousef's show, and eventually, the program was pulled from the airwaves. It also never returned to YouTube.

In Saudi Arabia, the leading and fastest growing YouTube channels are those created and operated by young Pro-Ams who have decided to shy away from direct political messages because of the restrictions on free speech in Saudi Arabia. They invested their talents in producing entertaining content and comic videos and managed to gain massive popularity. The channel *EyshElly* (Saudi colloquial for *What is it*?) has attracted more than 393 million views for its 109 videos, with an average of more than 3.6 million views for each video. However, this channel posted its last video in 2016 and seems to have remained inactive in its production since then. In the next section, we will analyze the unique use of YouTube in Saudi Arabia and the short-lived success of the YouTube Pro-Ams in this conservative country.

#### **3. The Saudi society, TV, and Internet**

Religion, geography, and economy give Saudi Arabia a unique status in the Arab world. Not only does it host the holy Islamic sites in Mecca and Medina but it also boasts the largest land mass area and largest economy out of the 22 Arab nations. The official title attached to the king of Saudi Arabia is "The Servant of the Two Honorable Holy Sites." The country's religious identity translates into a distinct level of conservatism, where women are not allowed to drive until very recently and freedom of expression is ranked by the Freedom House in 2017 as the fourth lowest in the Arab world, after Yemen, Sudan, and Syria [45]. Both religion and oil significantly influence Saudi society [46].

Upon its formation as an independent kingdom in 1932, the dwellers of its capital of Riyadh used to live within a fence that was built to protect the city. Although the fence was removed in 1959 to enlarge and modernize the city, Saudi Arabia's real opening to the world had to wait until information technology made its way to the kingdom. In 1965, Saudi Arabia began its national TV service [47], but the programming was strictly censored to guarantee adherence to Islamic teachings. All imported cultural commodities, such as books, magazines, and videos, were also closely scrutinized by the Ministry of Culture and Information. In the 1990s, the government of Saudi Arabia opened free-to-air satellite TV by granting its citizens the right to own dishes and receivers. Members of the Saudi royal family invested extensively in satellite TV networks. The giant MBC network was established in 1991 with the support of King Fahad Al Saud [48]. The governments of Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries, such as United Arab Emirates, Qatar, and Egypt, maintained their power over free-to-air satellite TV stations through direct ownership or connections with the other owners who come from the same circles of elite businessmen.

The state-run company Saudi Telecom began providing Internet for the public in 1998, and at this point, the Saudi cultural fence started to get thinner. Nonetheless, the government imposed legal restrictions and filters on the Internet. In 2002, a study examined 63,000 websites and found that the Saudi government had blocked 1353 sites—most of which were related to drugs, alcohol, explicit sex, bombs, gambling, or pages insulting the Islamic religion or Saudi regulations [49]. The government continued to monitor blogs, websites, chat rooms, social media sites, email content, and mobile phone text messages. Even today, it has the authority to obtain personal data from service providers without a court order. The Saudi blogger Ahmad Al-Farhan was jailed for 4 months for violating "non-security regulations." According to

**125**

*Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored*

Al-Farhan, he was arrested because he "wrote about political prisoners in Saudi Arabia" [50]. In 2011, a legislation aimed at ensuring Saudi bloggers are licensed was issued to pressure bloggers to self-regulate their posts and materials. In 2013, the Freedom House identified the media environment in Saudi Arabia as one of the

Despite these restrictions, the Internet became attractive in the Kingdom. As of December 2017, the Internet has reached 90.2% of the Saudi population [51]. In a country where movie theaters used to be forbidden and unrelated men and women were not allowed to converse in public places, the Internet is a place to socialize and seek entertainment. The Internet made it possible for the Saudis to live a "double life" as they comply with the conservative lifestyle publicly while engaging in a more liberated lifestyle online [52]. This might explain why "Saudi Arabia is the world's top YouTube nation [53]." The widespread usage of cell phones in Saudi Arabia, with more than 44.04 million mobile subscriptions and a penetration ratio of 138.7% in 2016 [54], could be a facilitating factor for accessing YouTube. According to a report in 2014, 50% of YouTube views in Saudi Arabia were via

YouTube users in Saudi Arabia are avid uploaders. In 2013, 35% of the YouTube

These leading channels describe their content using broad categories on their YouTube pages. *EyshElly* and *3ala6ayer* are comic channels with a satiric tone. *3ala6ayer* criticized social norms and traditions by mixing real scenes with staged scenes. However, it was forced to shut down in July of 2013 due to political and social pressures. *Al-Temsah* identifies itself as the best, most successful comic channel. The *Al-Temsah* and *La Yekthar* channels are part of the C3 Company, which was founded by young Saudis to stimulate creativity and provide opportunities for talented youth. *Sa7i*, *Aram TV*, and *Reality We Live* have a variety of playlists, but they have the same comic nature with a social reformist tone. *Alaa Wardi,* on the other hand, has two distinct features: it is named after its founder and sole operator,

These channels mix humor with social criticism while attempting to remain politically neutral. Although Saudi law does not have any stipulations about the content of social media, the government keeps an eye on any online taboo-breaching content. In 2011, Manal Al-Sharif posted a picture of herself driving a car on YouTube in order to encourage Saudi women to pursue the right to drive. Manal was arrested for several days and her picture was taken down, but the incident attracted global attention, demonstrating the power of YouTube in the kingdom. Even in the face of governmental restriction, many YouTube Pro-Ams in Saudi Arabia have managed for a substantial period to maintain their channels, upload videos regularly, attract a substantial share of YouTube's audience, and attract influential

users there have uploaded their own content [56]. Some young Saudi talents have decided to practice their TV skills on YouTube. As of February 2013, around 100 Saudi YouTube channels were active on YouTube, attracting more than two million views per week [1]. The leading Saudi YouTube channels were the following: *EyshElly*, *Al-Temsah* (The Crocodile), *La Yekthar* (Not Too Much), and *Sa7i* (Awake). The *EyshElly* channel is a part of the UTURN network that holds several channels on YouTube. **Table 1** provides the leading channels and shows the date each channel joined YouTube. The raw data was retrieved from the YouTube site of each channel. The *Sa7i* channel is operated by a group of young comedians who

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

most repressive in the world.

mobile devices [55].

**4. Saudi YouTube channels**

present social satire in their programs.

and it specializes in music.

#### *Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

Al-Farhan, he was arrested because he "wrote about political prisoners in Saudi Arabia" [50]. In 2011, a legislation aimed at ensuring Saudi bloggers are licensed was issued to pressure bloggers to self-regulate their posts and materials. In 2013, the Freedom House identified the media environment in Saudi Arabia as one of the most repressive in the world.

Despite these restrictions, the Internet became attractive in the Kingdom. As of December 2017, the Internet has reached 90.2% of the Saudi population [51]. In a country where movie theaters used to be forbidden and unrelated men and women were not allowed to converse in public places, the Internet is a place to socialize and seek entertainment. The Internet made it possible for the Saudis to live a "double life" as they comply with the conservative lifestyle publicly while engaging in a more liberated lifestyle online [52]. This might explain why "Saudi Arabia is the world's top YouTube nation [53]." The widespread usage of cell phones in Saudi Arabia, with more than 44.04 million mobile subscriptions and a penetration ratio of 138.7% in 2016 [54], could be a facilitating factor for accessing YouTube. According to a report in 2014, 50% of YouTube views in Saudi Arabia were via mobile devices [55].

#### **4. Saudi YouTube channels**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

media networks. Moving from YouTube to free airwaves, former Pro-Am Yousef turned into a full-fledged professional TV celebrity. However, the military regime in Egypt felt uncomfortable about the satiric tone of Yousef's show, and eventually, the

In Saudi Arabia, the leading and fastest growing YouTube channels are those created and operated by young Pro-Ams who have decided to shy away from direct political messages because of the restrictions on free speech in Saudi Arabia. They invested their talents in producing entertaining content and comic videos and managed to gain massive popularity. The channel *EyshElly* (Saudi colloquial for *What is it*?) has attracted more than 393 million views for its 109 videos, with an average of more than 3.6 million views for each video. However, this channel posted its last video in 2016 and seems to have remained inactive in its production since then. In the next section, we will analyze the unique use of YouTube in Saudi Arabia and the

Religion, geography, and economy give Saudi Arabia a unique status in the Arab world. Not only does it host the holy Islamic sites in Mecca and Medina but it also boasts the largest land mass area and largest economy out of the 22 Arab nations. The official title attached to the king of Saudi Arabia is "The Servant of the Two Honorable Holy Sites." The country's religious identity translates into a distinct level of conservatism, where women are not allowed to drive until very recently and freedom of expression is ranked by the Freedom House in 2017 as the fourth lowest in the Arab world, after Yemen, Sudan, and Syria [45]. Both religion and oil signifi-

Upon its formation as an independent kingdom in 1932, the dwellers of its capital of Riyadh used to live within a fence that was built to protect the city. Although the fence was removed in 1959 to enlarge and modernize the city, Saudi Arabia's real opening to the world had to wait until information technology made its way to the kingdom. In 1965, Saudi Arabia began its national TV service [47], but the programming was strictly censored to guarantee adherence to Islamic teachings. All imported cultural commodities, such as books, magazines, and videos, were also closely scrutinized by the Ministry of Culture and Information. In the 1990s, the government of Saudi Arabia opened free-to-air satellite TV by granting its citizens the right to own dishes and receivers. Members of the Saudi royal family invested extensively in satellite TV networks. The giant MBC network was established in 1991 with the support of King Fahad Al Saud [48]. The governments of Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries, such as United Arab Emirates, Qatar, and Egypt, maintained their power over free-to-air satellite TV stations through direct ownership or connections with the other owners who come from the same circles of elite

The state-run company Saudi Telecom began providing Internet for the public in 1998, and at this point, the Saudi cultural fence started to get thinner. Nonetheless, the government imposed legal restrictions and filters on the Internet. In 2002, a study examined 63,000 websites and found that the Saudi government had blocked 1353 sites—most of which were related to drugs, alcohol, explicit sex, bombs, gambling, or pages insulting the Islamic religion or Saudi regulations [49]. The government continued to monitor blogs, websites, chat rooms, social media sites, email content, and mobile phone text messages. Even today, it has the authority to obtain personal data from service providers without a court order. The Saudi blogger Ahmad Al-Farhan was jailed for 4 months for violating "non-security regulations." According to

program was pulled from the airwaves. It also never returned to YouTube.

short-lived success of the YouTube Pro-Ams in this conservative country.

**3. The Saudi society, TV, and Internet**

cantly influence Saudi society [46].

**124**

businessmen.

YouTube users in Saudi Arabia are avid uploaders. In 2013, 35% of the YouTube users there have uploaded their own content [56]. Some young Saudi talents have decided to practice their TV skills on YouTube. As of February 2013, around 100 Saudi YouTube channels were active on YouTube, attracting more than two million views per week [1]. The leading Saudi YouTube channels were the following: *EyshElly*, *Al-Temsah* (The Crocodile), *La Yekthar* (Not Too Much), and *Sa7i* (Awake). The *EyshElly* channel is a part of the UTURN network that holds several channels on YouTube. **Table 1** provides the leading channels and shows the date each channel joined YouTube. The raw data was retrieved from the YouTube site of each channel. The *Sa7i* channel is operated by a group of young comedians who present social satire in their programs.

These leading channels describe their content using broad categories on their YouTube pages. *EyshElly* and *3ala6ayer* are comic channels with a satiric tone. *3ala6ayer* criticized social norms and traditions by mixing real scenes with staged scenes. However, it was forced to shut down in July of 2013 due to political and social pressures. *Al-Temsah* identifies itself as the best, most successful comic channel. The *Al-Temsah* and *La Yekthar* channels are part of the C3 Company, which was founded by young Saudis to stimulate creativity and provide opportunities for talented youth. *Sa7i*, *Aram TV*, and *Reality We Live* have a variety of playlists, but they have the same comic nature with a social reformist tone. *Alaa Wardi,* on the other hand, has two distinct features: it is named after its founder and sole operator, and it specializes in music.

These channels mix humor with social criticism while attempting to remain politically neutral. Although Saudi law does not have any stipulations about the content of social media, the government keeps an eye on any online taboo-breaching content. In 2011, Manal Al-Sharif posted a picture of herself driving a car on YouTube in order to encourage Saudi women to pursue the right to drive. Manal was arrested for several days and her picture was taken down, but the incident attracted global attention, demonstrating the power of YouTube in the kingdom. Even in the face of governmental restriction, many YouTube Pro-Ams in Saudi Arabia have managed for a substantial period to maintain their channels, upload videos regularly, attract a substantial share of YouTube's audience, and attract influential


**Table 1.**

*Leading Saudi YouTube channels on the date they started in a descending order according to average views per video.*

advertisers, such as McDonald's, Pepsi, and Doritos. The next section presents the results of a field study that explores how some of these Pro-Ams define their YouTube business and perceive the opportunities and threats they experience.

#### **5. Method**

Using a longitudinal design, the authors sought to interview as much Saudi Pro-Ams as possible over two separate periods of times to see how this practice evolved and survived this strict political environment. We contacted 25 YouTube Pro-Ams in Saudi Arabia in 2013 and 2014 for in-depth interviews. We successfully completed 19 interviews with 18 males and one female using an unstructured questionnaire. The average number of questions asked in each interview was 24 questions.

Because of the lack of a sampling frame, we used the snowball sampling method to reach these Pro-Ams by starting with an acquaintance Pro-Am and asking him for help in contacting additional Pro-Ams. This industry was still unstructured and there was no data available about the number of either the companies or the staff working in these companies. Of the 19 Pro-Ams interviewed, 10 were Saudis and the rest were non-Saudis. We have decided not to identify the companies to keep the anonymity of the interviewees. The interviews were conducted at the work place of an interviewee's respective company. The location of each work place is a rented house with offices and production rooms. There was no gender segregation at these work places, which is not common in the Saudi conservative environment. Workers at these companies were observed communicating by mixing Arabic with English. Some interviewees tended to respond in Arabic and English, even though they had received their education in Saudi Arabia. All interviewees reported that they had no job other than working for a YouTube channel, but some of them originally retained their former jobs until they were able to produce an adequate income from their YouTube business. Four years later, the authors contacted the same respondents for another interview in order to track down how this business model evolved and perhaps took turns. However, only one Pro-Am accepted to participate on strict conditions of anonymity. The other previously interviewed YouTubers expressed their desire not to participate because "it is better to stay out of trouble" or they "have quit this business already." Others just excused themselves without giving apparent reasons. The political climate in Saudi Arabia seems to have changed dramatically from the first wave of interviews to the second wave, as the persecution and detention of activists and scholars are intensifying.

**127**

*Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored*

This indifference to participate in this longitudinal study limited the scope of the results. The authors expected that a private media enterprise operating within a state-run media system will be targeted by authorities to be either regulated or controlled. The indifference of most of the interviewees to participate in the second wave of interviews made it hard to examine this expectation empirically. The sole Saudi YouTuber who agreed to a second interview explained that all first-generation Saudi YouTubers have been put under the control of the security apparatus in the

From a close examination of the responses we recorded and the notes we took in the first wave of interviews, three themes emerged that summarize the phenomenon and the interviewees' perceptions. These themes are the following: the business

There were four strategies to securing funding for the interviewees' YouTube channels. Self-financing was the initial source of funding for most interviewees. One Pro-Am said that he had to borrow money from friends to start his project. Many Pro-Ams chose to rely on personal resources to remain independent from the influence of businessmen or major merchants. As a second strategy, a young businessman supported a channel financially in its first year until the channel began to make advertising profits. Advertising was the third and the most important strategy to raise funds. The fourth strategy was to secure funds through sponsorships of programs and underwriting. One sponsoring company repaid all the funds given to

Some interviewees turned down other sources of funding, including the refusal

Funding remained an issue despite the revenues from YouTube advertisements. All interviewed Pro-Ams were full Pros who depended solely on their income from YouTube. One interviewee said, "This is my only job, and at the end of the day, I need to put food on the table." The cost of producing one episode ranged from \$3500 to \$19,000, with an average of \$7700. Multiple ideas as to how to diversify sources of funding have been introduced. Some interviewees have thought of selling gadgets and t-shirts bearing the logo of the channel. Other interviewees have thought of using their talent and investing in their fame to perform as stand-up comedians in commercial theaters. Two interviewees said they thought of opening a bank account under the name of their channel and then making a national call for citizens to deposit donations into the account. They had to drop the idea because of legal complications. In a similar fundraising idea, a musician launched a donation campaign, asking his listeners to fund his songs on YouTube. The campaign was

Despite their struggle with securing funds for their channels, most of the interviewees reported that they were always ready to pay out of the pocket when the income coming from other sources was not enough. One interviewee said that he did not expect any financial gains at the beginning—the main drive for him was to

of an offer from MBC network to buy their channel and merge it into MBC. In another case, several young investors offered to buy shares of a channel—however, desiring to remain independent, the Pro-Ams turned down the offer. One interviewee mentioned that some politicians offered to sponsor political satiric pro-

model, the empowering components, and limitations to empowerment.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

**6.1 Theme 1: The business model**

a channel in its first year by the young businessman.

grams, but he did not want to enter this controversial area.

discontinued for a similar legal obstacle.

kingdom.

**6. Results**

*Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

This indifference to participate in this longitudinal study limited the scope of the results. The authors expected that a private media enterprise operating within a state-run media system will be targeted by authorities to be either regulated or controlled. The indifference of most of the interviewees to participate in the second wave of interviews made it hard to examine this expectation empirically. The sole Saudi YouTuber who agreed to a second interview explained that all first-generation Saudi YouTubers have been put under the control of the security apparatus in the kingdom.

#### **6. Results**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

**subscribers**

EyshElly 256,219,244 2,317,191 83 Feb. 24, 2011 3,086,979 El-temsah 196,184,240 1,784,682 108 Jun. 5, 2012 1,816,521 La Yekthar 85,324,100 856,607 48 Sep. 13, 2010 1,777,585 3ala6ayer 67,332,398 854,653 57 Sep. 8, 2010 1,181,270 Alaa Wardi 51,543,685 406,519 44 Oct. 2, 2008 1,171,447 Sa7i 314,943,193 1,934,537 390 Jan. 1, 2012 807,547

**Number of videos**

23,770,816 270,110 35 Apr. 12, 2012 679,166

**Date started Average views** 

**per video**

**Channel Total views Number of** 

advertisers, such as McDonald's, Pepsi, and Doritos. The next section presents the results of a field study that explores how some of these Pro-Ams define their YouTube business and perceive the opportunities and threats they experience.

Aram TV 154,776,026 1,107,954 595 Aug. 8, 2010 260,128

*Leading Saudi YouTube channels on the date they started in a descending order according to average views per video.*

Using a longitudinal design, the authors sought to interview as much Saudi Pro-Ams as possible over two separate periods of times to see how this practice evolved and survived this strict political environment. We contacted 25 YouTube Pro-Ams in Saudi Arabia in 2013 and 2014 for in-depth interviews. We successfully completed 19 interviews with 18 males and one female using an unstructured questionnaire. The average number of questions asked in each interview was 24 questions. Because of the lack of a sampling frame, we used the snowball sampling method to reach these Pro-Ams by starting with an acquaintance Pro-Am and asking him for help in contacting additional Pro-Ams. This industry was still unstructured and there was no data available about the number of either the companies or the staff working in these companies. Of the 19 Pro-Ams interviewed, 10 were Saudis and the rest were non-Saudis. We have decided not to identify the companies to keep the anonymity of the interviewees. The interviews were conducted at the work place of an interviewee's respective company. The location of each work place is a rented house with offices and production rooms. There was no gender segregation at these work places, which is not common in the Saudi conservative environment. Workers at these companies were observed communicating by mixing Arabic with English. Some interviewees tended to respond in Arabic and English, even though they had received their education in Saudi Arabia. All interviewees reported that they had no job other than working for a YouTube channel, but some of them originally retained their former jobs until they were able to produce an adequate income from their YouTube business. Four years later, the authors contacted the same respondents for another interview in order to track down how this business model evolved and perhaps took turns. However, only one Pro-Am accepted to participate on strict conditions of anonymity. The other previously interviewed YouTubers expressed their desire not to participate because "it is better to stay out of trouble" or they "have quit this business already." Others just excused themselves without giving apparent reasons. The political climate in Saudi Arabia seems to have changed dramatically from the first wave of interviews to the second wave, as the persecution and detention of activists and scholars are intensifying.

**126**

**5. Method**

**Table 1.**

A Reality We Live

> From a close examination of the responses we recorded and the notes we took in the first wave of interviews, three themes emerged that summarize the phenomenon and the interviewees' perceptions. These themes are the following: the business model, the empowering components, and limitations to empowerment.

#### **6.1 Theme 1: The business model**

There were four strategies to securing funding for the interviewees' YouTube channels. Self-financing was the initial source of funding for most interviewees. One Pro-Am said that he had to borrow money from friends to start his project. Many Pro-Ams chose to rely on personal resources to remain independent from the influence of businessmen or major merchants. As a second strategy, a young businessman supported a channel financially in its first year until the channel began to make advertising profits. Advertising was the third and the most important strategy to raise funds. The fourth strategy was to secure funds through sponsorships of programs and underwriting. One sponsoring company repaid all the funds given to a channel in its first year by the young businessman.

Some interviewees turned down other sources of funding, including the refusal of an offer from MBC network to buy their channel and merge it into MBC. In another case, several young investors offered to buy shares of a channel—however, desiring to remain independent, the Pro-Ams turned down the offer. One interviewee mentioned that some politicians offered to sponsor political satiric programs, but he did not want to enter this controversial area.

Funding remained an issue despite the revenues from YouTube advertisements. All interviewed Pro-Ams were full Pros who depended solely on their income from YouTube. One interviewee said, "This is my only job, and at the end of the day, I need to put food on the table." The cost of producing one episode ranged from \$3500 to \$19,000, with an average of \$7700. Multiple ideas as to how to diversify sources of funding have been introduced. Some interviewees have thought of selling gadgets and t-shirts bearing the logo of the channel. Other interviewees have thought of using their talent and investing in their fame to perform as stand-up comedians in commercial theaters. Two interviewees said they thought of opening a bank account under the name of their channel and then making a national call for citizens to deposit donations into the account. They had to drop the idea because of legal complications. In a similar fundraising idea, a musician launched a donation campaign, asking his listeners to fund his songs on YouTube. The campaign was discontinued for a similar legal obstacle.

Despite their struggle with securing funds for their channels, most of the interviewees reported that they were always ready to pay out of the pocket when the income coming from other sources was not enough. One interviewee said that he did not expect any financial gains at the beginning—the main drive for him was to practice his hobby. Such responses demonstrate that some of the interviewees have kept their amateurish spirit even though what they were doing became a job, not merely a hobby. Their production started to take an organizational structure, emulating the programing of traditional TV stations. For instance, they started to produce talk shows that comment on the coverage of Saudi newspapers and TV broadcasts and dramas that reflect the struggles of the Saudi youth [57]. When asked whether they were willing to follow Yousef's model of taking their programs to a mainstream TV network (also known as crossing over to traditional media), most of the interviewees said they would follow this model with one modification: retain the YouTube version of their program. One interviewee said, "YouTube is like our baby," showing how passionately he was attached to his YouTube experience. Another interviewee identified himself as a "YouTuber." A third interviewee reported turning down the model completely. He explained that they had received an offer from a satellite TV channel, but the revenues they made from YouTube were higher than the offer.

In the second wave of interviews, it was evident that this financial model did not survive the political and economic reality in the kingdom. Some YouTubers were persecuted and jailed, and with his imprisonment, the channel had to freeze. In another instance, one producer bought the shares of all other partners at the UTURN company but could not afford the cost of production and eventually switched gears and became an advertiser rather than a content generator on YouTube. Eventually, this business model could not survive the political and economic context and was replaced with the "independent content creators" as termed by the only interviewee in the second wave of data gathering. This group work disintegrated into individuals working independently by creating simple content, such as social experiments, and making revenue through garnering massive views and sharing the income with YouTube. This model gained popularity after YouTube had changed the policy of its Partner Program (YPP) in January of 2018. According to this policy, "the eligibility requirement for monetization became 4000 hours of watch time within the past 12 months and 1000 subscribers [58]." According to Kaswara Alkhatib, CEO of UTURN, "most of the revenue is from advertising. It comes from brand integration, product placements, and branded content [59]." UTURN is the current market leader with more than 50 channels, 33 million followers, and 102 million monthly views. This company has now partnered with the Emirati media incubator *In5 Media* to transition into being a multi-channel platform and a market leader across the Arab world.

The number of team members that was needed to produce and market one episode before the demise of those YouTube channels ranged from one to 30, with an average of eight crew-members. The monthly episode production of a channel ranged from one to 10 episodes, but the average for each channel was four episodes per month. However, the interviewees appreciated the flexibility of their business model. They were not under the pressure of deadlines or fixed schedules of programming. They set themselves apart from ground and satellite TV stations by appealing mainly to the youth and presenting pure local content. The model allowed them more flexibility for emulating Western formats. Most of the interviewees reported that specific American shows were inspirational to them. They also reported that they had in mind several show hosts, such as George Carlin, Dave Chappelle, Stephen Colbert, and John Stewart, when they were planning their own productions. Some Pro-Ams had also produced Saudi versions of Western rap music. One interviewee said that all their ideas came from other sources as "there are no original ideas under the sun anymore."

#### **6.2 Theme 2: The empowering components**

The majority of the interviewees realized at one point that they had a talent, but no public outlet for it. According to what they said, YouTube empowered them to

**129**

success of the show.

*Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored*

have public access and exposure. They wanted to "experiment," "work without any filtrations," "stay away from the 'enslaving' work environment of traditional TV stations," and "have no red lines." They have also realized how widespread YouTube use was, as well as the high percentage of Internet connectivity in Saudi Arabia. YouTube provided them with a low-cost, easy-to-use, un-mediated, routine-free,

The freedom to think, create, and break away from old formats was an essential component in empowering these YouTube talents. There is no outside authority to "dictate what to write and produce." They wanted to decide their own content and make it relevant to the youth in the Kingdom. Initially, YouTube helped them to express their own views in the format of their choice and the colloquial Saudi they prefer, thus setting them apart from traditional TV. According to one interviewee, i have never watched any [Arabic] TV channel in the past 5 years.i have lived for 29 years in Saudi Arabia and never had a feeling toward the programs or episodes on any channel. What is presented on national TV is the production of an old genera-

Most of the interviewees think that their channels have empowered them to change the industry and make people know and think more about the illnesses of their society. One interviewee was confident that their YouTube experiment will determine "the future of television and the industry at large." The interviewees have their own visions about their impact on their Saudi society. According to one Pro-Am, "YouTube helped us shed light on social problems and give people the chance to form opinions and think of solutions." Another Pro-Am thought that their content is entertaining, but it "has a message and makes people think." Some interviewees feel they have become "YouTube celebrities" in society, just like sports and TV stars.

The Pro-Ams interviewed shared a similar perception of their experimental approach to YouTube. They sought to broadcast their own agenda of topics, thoughts, and convictions without having to follow a particular agenda. Moving into the threshold of professionalism, however, their agenda could not remain independent. One Pro-Am observed that some of their YouTube channels had started to adapt to the demands of the advertisers. He predicted that they were turning into commercial entrepreneurs who are ready to "produce what they are paid to produce." Another Pro-Am said, at the beginning, we tried many things and learned by trial-and-error. With time we learned how the market works and what the audience needs… there were many things that determined what to produce and how to produce it, but the most important factor was the commercial

It is not only the market and audience's needs that contributed to setting the interviewees' agenda, but also politics and religion. According to one Pro-Am, "The red lines for us are politics and religion." Most of the Pro-Ams wanted to make sure that they did not aggravate the government or offend any religious figures in their brainstorming sessions. Some interviewees said that they had to remove some of their already uploaded shows because of receiving either an angry feedback from the audience, a notice from the government, or a legal advice from lawyer acquaintances. According to Daoudi [57], the Saudi Ministry of Interior sent a letter to one YouTube channel reminding them that one of their episodes offended Egyptian nationals, to which the Egyptian Consular in the Kingdom has objected. The team operating the channel decided to take the episode down. One Pro-Am adopted the policy of not presenting any content that was critical of the government. In one show, the hard life and low wages of sanitation workers in the Kingdom were portrayed; however, the

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

tion, which does not suit us or portray our real lives.

**6.3 Theme 3: limitations of empowerment**

and popular public outlet.

#### *Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

have public access and exposure. They wanted to "experiment," "work without any filtrations," "stay away from the 'enslaving' work environment of traditional TV stations," and "have no red lines." They have also realized how widespread YouTube use was, as well as the high percentage of Internet connectivity in Saudi Arabia. YouTube provided them with a low-cost, easy-to-use, un-mediated, routine-free, and popular public outlet.

The freedom to think, create, and break away from old formats was an essential component in empowering these YouTube talents. There is no outside authority to "dictate what to write and produce." They wanted to decide their own content and make it relevant to the youth in the Kingdom. Initially, YouTube helped them to express their own views in the format of their choice and the colloquial Saudi they prefer, thus setting them apart from traditional TV. According to one interviewee, i have never watched any [Arabic] TV channel in the past 5 years.i have lived for 29 years in Saudi Arabia and never had a feeling toward the programs or episodes on any channel. What is presented on national TV is the production of an old generation, which does not suit us or portray our real lives.

Most of the interviewees think that their channels have empowered them to change the industry and make people know and think more about the illnesses of their society. One interviewee was confident that their YouTube experiment will determine "the future of television and the industry at large." The interviewees have their own visions about their impact on their Saudi society. According to one Pro-Am, "YouTube helped us shed light on social problems and give people the chance to form opinions and think of solutions." Another Pro-Am thought that their content is entertaining, but it "has a message and makes people think." Some interviewees feel they have become "YouTube celebrities" in society, just like sports and TV stars.

#### **6.3 Theme 3: limitations of empowerment**

The Pro-Ams interviewed shared a similar perception of their experimental approach to YouTube. They sought to broadcast their own agenda of topics, thoughts, and convictions without having to follow a particular agenda. Moving into the threshold of professionalism, however, their agenda could not remain independent. One Pro-Am observed that some of their YouTube channels had started to adapt to the demands of the advertisers. He predicted that they were turning into commercial entrepreneurs who are ready to "produce what they are paid to produce." Another Pro-Am said, at the beginning, we tried many things and learned by trial-and-error. With time we learned how the market works and what the audience needs… there were many things that determined what to produce and how to produce it, but the most important factor was the commercial success of the show.

It is not only the market and audience's needs that contributed to setting the interviewees' agenda, but also politics and religion. According to one Pro-Am, "The red lines for us are politics and religion." Most of the Pro-Ams wanted to make sure that they did not aggravate the government or offend any religious figures in their brainstorming sessions. Some interviewees said that they had to remove some of their already uploaded shows because of receiving either an angry feedback from the audience, a notice from the government, or a legal advice from lawyer acquaintances. According to Daoudi [57], the Saudi Ministry of Interior sent a letter to one YouTube channel reminding them that one of their episodes offended Egyptian nationals, to which the Egyptian Consular in the Kingdom has objected. The team operating the channel decided to take the episode down. One Pro-Am adopted the policy of not presenting any content that was critical of the government. In one show, the hard life and low wages of sanitation workers in the Kingdom were portrayed; however, the

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

but the revenues they made from YouTube were higher than the offer.

multi-channel platform and a market leader across the Arab world.

**6.2 Theme 2: The empowering components**

The number of team members that was needed to produce and market one episode before the demise of those YouTube channels ranged from one to 30, with an average of eight crew-members. The monthly episode production of a channel ranged from one to 10 episodes, but the average for each channel was four episodes per month. However, the interviewees appreciated the flexibility of their business model. They were not under the pressure of deadlines or fixed schedules of programming. They set themselves apart from ground and satellite TV stations by appealing mainly to the youth and presenting pure local content. The model allowed them more flexibility for emulating Western formats. Most of the interviewees reported that specific American shows were inspirational to them. They also reported that they had in mind several show hosts, such as George Carlin, Dave Chappelle, Stephen Colbert, and John Stewart, when they were planning their own productions. Some Pro-Ams had also produced Saudi versions of Western rap music. One interviewee said that all their ideas came from other sources as "there are no original ideas under the sun anymore."

The majority of the interviewees realized at one point that they had a talent, but no public outlet for it. According to what they said, YouTube empowered them to

In the second wave of interviews, it was evident that this financial model did not survive the political and economic reality in the kingdom. Some YouTubers were persecuted and jailed, and with his imprisonment, the channel had to freeze. In another instance, one producer bought the shares of all other partners at the UTURN company but could not afford the cost of production and eventually switched gears and became an advertiser rather than a content generator on YouTube. Eventually, this business model could not survive the political and economic context and was replaced with the "independent content creators" as termed by the only interviewee in the second wave of data gathering. This group work disintegrated into individuals working independently by creating simple content, such as social experiments, and making revenue through garnering massive views and sharing the income with YouTube. This model gained popularity after YouTube had changed the policy of its Partner Program (YPP) in January of 2018. According to this policy, "the eligibility requirement for monetization became 4000 hours of watch time within the past 12 months and 1000 subscribers [58]." According to Kaswara Alkhatib, CEO of UTURN, "most of the revenue is from advertising. It comes from brand integration, product placements, and branded content [59]." UTURN is the current market leader with more than 50 channels, 33 million followers, and 102 million monthly views. This company has now partnered with the Emirati media incubator *In5 Media* to transition into being a

practice his hobby. Such responses demonstrate that some of the interviewees have kept their amateurish spirit even though what they were doing became a job, not merely a hobby. Their production started to take an organizational structure, emulating the programing of traditional TV stations. For instance, they started to produce talk shows that comment on the coverage of Saudi newspapers and TV broadcasts and dramas that reflect the struggles of the Saudi youth [57]. When asked whether they were willing to follow Yousef's model of taking their programs to a mainstream TV network (also known as crossing over to traditional media), most of the interviewees said they would follow this model with one modification: retain the YouTube version of their program. One interviewee said, "YouTube is like our baby," showing how passionately he was attached to his YouTube experience. Another interviewee identified himself as a "YouTuber." A third interviewee reported turning down the model completely. He explained that they had received an offer from a satellite TV channel,

**128**

producer did not criticize governmental officials. Another Pro-Am had an idea for an episode about animal rights in the Kingdom, but the channel turned down the idea because the topic would not be welcomed by other Saudis.

Some interviewees mentioned that they were under police surveillance, which led them to use caution while talking over the phone. One interviewee thought that "it is normal to be monitored by the government." For those who did not think they were monitored, they assumed they had never aggravated the government nor did anything that would "invite this kind of a surveillance."

The lack of specific regulations or guidelines about operating YouTube channels in Saudi Arabia was a daily challenge for the interviewees. They had to guess what was tolerated and what was frowned upon by the government when writing their scripts. In one instance, the police arrested a camera crew and confiscated their equipment when they were shooting an outdoor scene without having permission from the Ministry of Information. Yet at the same time, YouTubers are not recognized by law as reporters or TV professionals who must seek licensing from the Ministry. Several other interviewees reported similar encounters with the police during their outdoor shoots. Most interviewees stated that it is confusing to be "regulated" without explicit regulations. In other areas, such as the U.S., Pro-Ams are protected by the law. In 2011, a U.S. court ruled that "even though someone might not write for the institutional media, they are entitled to all the protections the constitution grants journalists" [60].

Those who stayed in this business focused on creating entertaining content, especially after the arrest of the team of *Telfaz11*, another Saudi YouTube channel established in 2011, for 10 days in 2017. The interviewee of the second wave of data gathering reported that Ahmed Alshokairy, consultant and presenter at Aram Media House in Saudi Arabia, was under a travel ban for 1 year until it was eventually lifted in 2018.

#### **7. Conclusion**

YouTube invites its Pro-Am users to "broadcast themselves," but Pro-Ams, either consciously or unconsciously, broadcast the expectations of their society, advertisers, and government along with "broadcasting themselves." The interviewees provided conflicting reflections on how free and uncensored they felt. Those contradictory perceptions ranged from perceiving "no outside authority dictating what to produce" to being cognizant of "the red lines imposed by both politics and religion." Such inconsistent views might be referred to how those YouTubers were perceived as a threat by the state apparatus. Tackling political and religious issues would bring those Pro-Ams under scrutiny, or even lead to their imprisonment. For those who stayed away from "red lines," the sense of freedom was normally heightened. With the evolving of this phenomenon of independent Saudi YouTube channels and the change in the political leadership in 2015, the grip of the government became tighter and the scope of red lines became wider. According to Human Rights Watch, the number of those detained under investigation for more than 6 months without trial rose from 293 people in May 2014 to 2305 detainees in May 2018 [61].

Some of the citizen YouTube channels in Saudi Arabia have turned into professional ventures, attracting many fans, a significant amount of advertising dollars, and an identifiable amount of governmental scrutiny. These channels established the niche of localism in the TV market. They have gained their popularity through focusing on local topics and using a local dialect in a highly connected society. The staff of these channels started out with the spirit of amateurs, but over time, they have acquired the mentality and approach of professionals. In the initial stages of

**131**

of this phenomenon and its ramifications.

*Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored*

their YouTube experience, they desired to present their talents, views, and stories to the public. Eventually, however, they felt driven by the public and "the elite to professionalize" [62] and institutionalize their YouTube productions. In some cases, a 30-member crew was used to produce one episode. The results of the present study show that the average size for producing any content for YouTube was 6 crew members. Previous research also showed the complexity of genres that those Pro-Ams have adopted. More importantly, they had to modify their agenda to accommodate the

Technology has empowered these Pro-Ams to gain a public platform without having to follow the traditional, routine-shackled path of traditional media. Pro-Ams felt they were empowered to provide knowledge and help their audience to think and form opinions. The liberating power of technology has been limited, however, by the nature of the business model, the Saudi culture, and the security concerns of the regime. This supports previous research that has shown that the potential of "YouTube for fostering civic cultures is significantly impeded by security issues [63]." In the Saudi case of YouTube channels, the lack of regulations limits the empowering quality of the technology. The interviewees had to practice self-censorship, seek unofficial legal advice, and filter or sometimes delete their own shows according to their expectations of the governmental reactions—not to their understanding of the working regulations. Such political and financial pressures resulted in forcing some of those Pro-Ams out of the market and made others switch into the model of single content creators. The first stages on Grönlund's model [30] seem to fit the case of Saudi YouTubers, but the last stage of empowerment on the model is not equally compatible. Those YouTubers created their own

dictations of the market, the public's taste, and the political regime.

niche, but the political environment limited their empowerment.

This limited empowering force of Internet technology in the case of Saudi YouTubers supports the criticism directed toward the theory of technological determinism (TD). According to this theory, technology is either ascribed with omnipotence (hard determinism) to shape society and provide the necessary conditions for social change, or deemed capable of facilitating change (soft determinism) according to other social and cultural factors [64, 65]. This linear cause-effect relationship between technology and social change was critiqued for its simplified formula. According to Murphie and Potts, it is rather an intertwining relationship where "technology does not determine [change] but "operates and gets operated upon in a complex social field" [66]. Both politics and culture suppressed, rather than facilitated, the capability of technology of fostering radical changes in the media landscape of the Kingdom. Instead, the political regime reinvented its control over all local media outlets and redirecting those YouTubers toward specific genres of programming. The results of the present study suggest that the online digital technology in a state-run media system drives the regime to create a controlled environment for the public use of this technology. Instead of creating new venues for creativity and free expression, communication technology alerts power groups to model mass communication through the digital media according to the model of state-run, traditional media. This study has explored some aspects of the citizen YouTube channels in Saudi Arabia, yet it calls the attention to the important transformations that YouTube, in specific, and digital media, in general, is producing in politically rigid and socially conservative societies. The study also highlights the importance of using different methodologies to examine the legal, aesthetical, organizational, and ethical aspects

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

#### *Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

their YouTube experience, they desired to present their talents, views, and stories to the public. Eventually, however, they felt driven by the public and "the elite to professionalize" [62] and institutionalize their YouTube productions. In some cases, a 30-member crew was used to produce one episode. The results of the present study show that the average size for producing any content for YouTube was 6 crew members. Previous research also showed the complexity of genres that those Pro-Ams have adopted. More importantly, they had to modify their agenda to accommodate the dictations of the market, the public's taste, and the political regime.

Technology has empowered these Pro-Ams to gain a public platform without having to follow the traditional, routine-shackled path of traditional media. Pro-Ams felt they were empowered to provide knowledge and help their audience to think and form opinions. The liberating power of technology has been limited, however, by the nature of the business model, the Saudi culture, and the security concerns of the regime. This supports previous research that has shown that the potential of "YouTube for fostering civic cultures is significantly impeded by security issues [63]." In the Saudi case of YouTube channels, the lack of regulations limits the empowering quality of the technology. The interviewees had to practice self-censorship, seek unofficial legal advice, and filter or sometimes delete their own shows according to their expectations of the governmental reactions—not to their understanding of the working regulations. Such political and financial pressures resulted in forcing some of those Pro-Ams out of the market and made others switch into the model of single content creators. The first stages on Grönlund's model [30] seem to fit the case of Saudi YouTubers, but the last stage of empowerment on the model is not equally compatible. Those YouTubers created their own niche, but the political environment limited their empowerment.

This limited empowering force of Internet technology in the case of Saudi YouTubers supports the criticism directed toward the theory of technological determinism (TD). According to this theory, technology is either ascribed with omnipotence (hard determinism) to shape society and provide the necessary conditions for social change, or deemed capable of facilitating change (soft determinism) according to other social and cultural factors [64, 65]. This linear cause-effect relationship between technology and social change was critiqued for its simplified formula. According to Murphie and Potts, it is rather an intertwining relationship where "technology does not determine [change] but "operates and gets operated upon in a complex social field" [66]. Both politics and culture suppressed, rather than facilitated, the capability of technology of fostering radical changes in the media landscape of the Kingdom. Instead, the political regime reinvented its control over all local media outlets and redirecting those YouTubers toward specific genres of programming. The results of the present study suggest that the online digital technology in a state-run media system drives the regime to create a controlled environment for the public use of this technology. Instead of creating new venues for creativity and free expression, communication technology alerts power groups to model mass communication through the digital media according to the model of state-run, traditional media.

This study has explored some aspects of the citizen YouTube channels in Saudi Arabia, yet it calls the attention to the important transformations that YouTube, in specific, and digital media, in general, is producing in politically rigid and socially conservative societies. The study also highlights the importance of using different methodologies to examine the legal, aesthetical, organizational, and ethical aspects of this phenomenon and its ramifications.

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

because the topic would not be welcomed by other Saudis.

anything that would "invite this kind of a surveillance."

the constitution grants journalists" [60].

ally lifted in 2018.

**7. Conclusion**

producer did not criticize governmental officials. Another Pro-Am had an idea for an episode about animal rights in the Kingdom, but the channel turned down the idea

Some interviewees mentioned that they were under police surveillance, which led them to use caution while talking over the phone. One interviewee thought that "it is normal to be monitored by the government." For those who did not think they were monitored, they assumed they had never aggravated the government nor did

The lack of specific regulations or guidelines about operating YouTube channels in Saudi Arabia was a daily challenge for the interviewees. They had to guess what was tolerated and what was frowned upon by the government when writing their scripts. In one instance, the police arrested a camera crew and confiscated their equipment when they were shooting an outdoor scene without having permission from the Ministry of Information. Yet at the same time, YouTubers are not recognized by law as reporters or TV professionals who must seek licensing from the Ministry. Several other interviewees reported similar encounters with the police during their outdoor shoots. Most interviewees stated that it is confusing to be "regulated" without explicit regulations. In other areas, such as the U.S., Pro-Ams are protected by the law. In 2011, a U.S. court ruled that "even though someone might not write for the institutional media, they are entitled to all the protections

Those who stayed in this business focused on creating entertaining content, especially after the arrest of the team of *Telfaz11*, another Saudi YouTube channel established in 2011, for 10 days in 2017. The interviewee of the second wave of data gathering reported that Ahmed Alshokairy, consultant and presenter at Aram Media House in Saudi Arabia, was under a travel ban for 1 year until it was eventu-

YouTube invites its Pro-Am users to "broadcast themselves," but Pro-Ams, either

consciously or unconsciously, broadcast the expectations of their society, advertisers, and government along with "broadcasting themselves." The interviewees provided conflicting reflections on how free and uncensored they felt. Those contradictory perceptions ranged from perceiving "no outside authority dictating what to produce" to being cognizant of "the red lines imposed by both politics and religion." Such inconsistent views might be referred to how those YouTubers were perceived as a threat by the state apparatus. Tackling political and religious issues would bring those Pro-Ams under scrutiny, or even lead to their imprisonment. For those who stayed away from "red lines," the sense of freedom was normally heightened. With the evolving of this phenomenon of independent Saudi YouTube channels and the change in the political leadership in 2015, the grip of the government became tighter and the scope of red lines became wider. According to Human Rights Watch, the number of those detained under investigation for more than 6 months without trial

rose from 293 people in May 2014 to 2305 detainees in May 2018 [61].

Some of the citizen YouTube channels in Saudi Arabia have turned into professional ventures, attracting many fans, a significant amount of advertising dollars, and an identifiable amount of governmental scrutiny. These channels established the niche of localism in the TV market. They have gained their popularity through focusing on local topics and using a local dialect in a highly connected society. The staff of these channels started out with the spirit of amateurs, but over time, they have acquired the mentality and approach of professionals. In the initial stages of

**130**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

#### **Author details**

Hesham Mesbah1 \* and Nasser Almujaibel<sup>2</sup>

1 Department of Communication Studies, Rollins College, Winter Park, FL, USA

2 Department of Mass Communication, Kuwait University, Kuwait

\*Address all correspondence to: hmesbah@rollins.edu

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

**133**

*Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored*

pp. 406-423

2012;**34**(1):53-67

2006

labor. In: Snickars P, editor. YouTube Reader. Lithuania: Logotipas; 2009.

[11] Kim J. The institutionalization of YouTube: From user-generated content to professionally generated content. Media, Culture and Society.

[12] Sorkin A. Dot-com Boom Echoed in Deal to Buy YouTube. New York Times;

[13] Stelter B. YouTube Videos Pull in Real Money. New York Times; 2008

[14] Dylko IB, Beam M, Landreville K,

presidential election news on YouTube by elites and nonelites: An examination of the democratizing potential of the internet. New Media & Society.

[15] Bakker TB. Citizens as political participants: The myth of the active online audience? [PhD thesis]. Amsterdam: The University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam School of Communication Research; 2013. Available from: http://dare.uva. nl/document/2/118279 [Accessed:

[16] Artero JP. Online Video Business Models: YouTube vs. Hulu. Palabra

Geidner N. Filtering 2008 US

2012;**14**(5):832-849

03 January 2015]

Clave. 2010;**13**(1):111-123

[17] Bergström A. The reluctant audience: Online participation in the Swedish journalistic context. Westminster Papers in Communication

and Culture. 2008;**5**(2):60-79

[18] Roca-Sales M. The future of television: From the boob tube to YouTube. American Communication Journal. 2009;**11**(1):1-11. Available from: http://ac-journal.org/journal/2009/ Spring/Articles/110102%20The%20

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

[1] Smith M. Young Saudis Getting Creative on YouTube; Reuters. 2013. Available from: http://www.reuters. com/article/2013/11/18/us-saudiyoutube-idUSBRE9AH0GY20131118

[2] Socialbakers. YouTube Statistics for Saudi Arabia. 2015. Available from: http://www.socialbakers.com/statistics/ youtube/channels/saudi-arabia/ [Accessed: 02 January 2015]

[3] Digibuzz. Social Media Sage in Saudi Arabia; Digibuzz. 2013. Available from: http://www.digibuzzme.com/socialksa/ [Accessed: 02 January 2015]

[5] Cloud J. The gurus of YouTube. Time

[6] Castells M. Communication, power and counter-power in the network society. International Journal of Communication. 2007;**1**:238-266

[7] Grusin R. YouTube at the end of new media. In: Snickars P, Vonderau P, editors. YouTube Reader. Lithuania:

[8] Keenan A, Shiri A. Sociability and social interaction on social networking. Library Review. 2009;**58**(6):438-450

[9] Variety. Survey: YouTube Stars More Popular Than Mainstream Celebs among U.S. Teens; Variety. 2014.

digital/news/survey-youtube-

Available from: http://variety.com/2014/

starsmore-popular-than-mainstreamcelebs-among-u-s-teens-1201275245 [Accessed: 11 November 2018]

[10] Andrejevic M. Exploiting YouTube: The contradictions of user-generated

[4] Jarrett K. Beyond broadcast yourself™: The future of YouTube. Media International Australia.

International. 2006;**168**:34-40

Logotipas; 2009. pp. 60-67

2008;**126**:132-144

[Accessed: 02 January 2015]

**References**

*Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

#### **References**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

**132**

**Author details**

Hesham Mesbah1

\* and Nasser Almujaibel<sup>2</sup>

\*Address all correspondence to: hmesbah@rollins.edu

provided the original work is properly cited.

2 Department of Mass Communication, Kuwait University, Kuwait

1 Department of Communication Studies, Rollins College, Winter Park, FL, USA

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,

[1] Smith M. Young Saudis Getting Creative on YouTube; Reuters. 2013. Available from: http://www.reuters. com/article/2013/11/18/us-saudiyoutube-idUSBRE9AH0GY20131118 [Accessed: 02 January 2015]

[2] Socialbakers. YouTube Statistics for Saudi Arabia. 2015. Available from: http://www.socialbakers.com/statistics/ youtube/channels/saudi-arabia/ [Accessed: 02 January 2015]

[3] Digibuzz. Social Media Sage in Saudi Arabia; Digibuzz. 2013. Available from: http://www.digibuzzme.com/socialksa/ [Accessed: 02 January 2015]

[4] Jarrett K. Beyond broadcast yourself™: The future of YouTube. Media International Australia. 2008;**126**:132-144

[5] Cloud J. The gurus of YouTube. Time International. 2006;**168**:34-40

[6] Castells M. Communication, power and counter-power in the network society. International Journal of Communication. 2007;**1**:238-266

[7] Grusin R. YouTube at the end of new media. In: Snickars P, Vonderau P, editors. YouTube Reader. Lithuania: Logotipas; 2009. pp. 60-67

[8] Keenan A, Shiri A. Sociability and social interaction on social networking. Library Review. 2009;**58**(6):438-450

[9] Variety. Survey: YouTube Stars More Popular Than Mainstream Celebs among U.S. Teens; Variety. 2014. Available from: http://variety.com/2014/ digital/news/survey-youtubestarsmore-popular-than-mainstreamcelebs-among-u-s-teens-1201275245 [Accessed: 11 November 2018]

[10] Andrejevic M. Exploiting YouTube: The contradictions of user-generated

labor. In: Snickars P, editor. YouTube Reader. Lithuania: Logotipas; 2009. pp. 406-423

[11] Kim J. The institutionalization of YouTube: From user-generated content to professionally generated content. Media, Culture and Society. 2012;**34**(1):53-67

[12] Sorkin A. Dot-com Boom Echoed in Deal to Buy YouTube. New York Times; 2006

[13] Stelter B. YouTube Videos Pull in Real Money. New York Times; 2008

[14] Dylko IB, Beam M, Landreville K, Geidner N. Filtering 2008 US presidential election news on YouTube by elites and nonelites: An examination of the democratizing potential of the internet. New Media & Society. 2012;**14**(5):832-849

[15] Bakker TB. Citizens as political participants: The myth of the active online audience? [PhD thesis]. Amsterdam: The University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam School of Communication Research; 2013. Available from: http://dare.uva. nl/document/2/118279 [Accessed: 03 January 2015]

[16] Artero JP. Online Video Business Models: YouTube vs. Hulu. Palabra Clave. 2010;**13**(1):111-123

[17] Bergström A. The reluctant audience: Online participation in the Swedish journalistic context. Westminster Papers in Communication and Culture. 2008;**5**(2):60-79

[18] Roca-Sales M. The future of television: From the boob tube to YouTube. American Communication Journal. 2009;**11**(1):1-11. Available from: http://ac-journal.org/journal/2009/ Spring/Articles/110102%20The%20

Future%20of%20Television.pdf [Accessed: 24 December 2014]

[19] Simonsen TM. Categorizing YouTube. MedieKultur: Journal of Media and Communication Research. 2011;**27**(51):72-93

[20] Rich M. OTT Breaks out of Its Netflix Shell. 2017. Available from: https://www.comscore.com/Insights/ Blog/OTT-Breaks-Out-of-Its-Netflix-Shell [Accessed: 11 November 2018]

[21] Shih G. Analysis: YouTube Alienates Amateur Users by Courting Pros; San Francisco: Reuters. 2012. Available from: http://www.reuters.com/ article/2012/10/04/us-youtube-cultureidUSBRE8931K420121004 [Accessed: 03 January 2015]

[22] Cha M, Kwak H, Rodriguez P, Ahn YY, Moon S. I Tube, You Tube, Everybody Tubes: Analyzing the World's Largest User Generated Content Video System. IMC'07. 2007. Available from: http://conferences.sigcomm.org/ imc/2007/papers/imc131.pdf [Accessed: 25 December 2014]

[23] Tapscott D, Williams A. Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything. New York: Portfolio; 2006

[24] Kim J. User-generated content (UGC) revolution?: Critique of the promise of YouTube [PhD (doctor of philosophy) thesis]. Iowa: Iowa State University; 2010. Available from http://ir.uiowa.edu/cgi/viewcontent. cgi?article=1714&context=etd [Accessed: 24 December 2014]

[25] Miller K. Playing Along: Digital Games, YouTube and Virtual Performance. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press; 2012

[26] Soukup PA. Looking at, with, and through YouTube™. Communication Research Trends. 2014;**33**(3):3-34

[27] Kwak H, Lee C, Park H, Moon S. What is Twitter, A Social Network or a News Media? In: Proceedings of the 19th International Conference on World Wide Web. 2010. pp. 591-600. Available from: http://dl.acm.org/citation. cfm?id=1772751 [Accessed: 03 January 2015]

[28] Pingree RJ. How messages affect their senders: A more general model of message effects and implications for deliberation. Communication Theory. 2007;**17**(4):439-461

[29] Zúñiga HG, Molyneux L, Zheng P. Social media, political expression, and political participation: Panel analysis of lagged and concurrent relationships. Journal of Communication. 2014;**64**(4):612-634

[30] Grönlund A. ICT is not participation, is not democracy: eParticipation development models revisited. In: Macintosh A, Tambouris E, editors. ePart 2009. Vol. 5694. Heidelberg: Springer; 2009. pp. 12-23

[31] Gauntlett D. Making Is Connecting: The Social Meaning of Creativity, from DIY and Knitting to YouTube and Web 2.0. Cambridge: Polity Press; 2011

[32] Miles J. YouTube Marketing Ower: How to Use Video to Find More Prospects, Launch Your Products, and Reach a Massive Audience. New York: McGraw-Hill; 2013

[33] Haridakis P, Hanson G. Social interaction and co-viewing with YouTube: Blending mass communication reception and social connection. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media. 2009;**53**(2):317-335

[34] Madden A, Ruthven I, McMenemy D. A classification scheme for content analyses of YouTube video comments. Journal of Documentation. 2013;**69**(5): 693-714

**135**

*Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored*

Journalism: Trends, Connections, and Implications. London: IntechOpen; 2018. p. 40. Available from: https:// www.intechopen.com/books/ social-media-and-journalismtrends-connections-implications/ social-media-a-turning-point-intoglobal-journalism-identity-and-ethics

[Accessed: 18 December 2018]

[44] Dijck JV. Users like you?

2009;**3**(1):41-58

10 November 2018]

Theorizing agency in user-generated content. Media, Culture and Society.

[45] Freedom House. Freedom in the World. 2017. Available from: https:// freedomhouse.org/report/fiw-2017 table-country-scores [Accessed:

[46] Marghalani K, Palmgreen P,

[47] PBS. Frontline. 2015. Available from: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/ frontline/shows/saudi/etc/cron.html

[48] Sakr N. Whys and Wherefores of Satellite Channel Oownership. 2001. Available from: http://acc.teachmideast. org/texts.php?module\_id=13&reading\_ id=1029&sequence=3 [Accessed:

Documentation of Internet Filtering in Saudi Arabia. 2002. Available from: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/filtering/ saudiarabia/ [Accessed: 02 January 2015]

[50] Reporters Without Borders. 2008. Available from: http://en.rsf.org/ saudi-arabia-blogger-fouad-al-farhanfreed-28-04-2008,26746 [Accessed:

[51] Internet World Stats. Middle East. 2018. Available from: https://www.

Media. 1998;**42**(3):297-317

[Accessed: 04 January 2015]

01 January 2015]

04 January 2015]

[49] Zittrain J, Edelman B.

Boyd D. The utilization of direct satellite broadcasting (DBS) in Saudi Arabia. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

[35] Lange PT. Achieving Creative Integrity on Youtube: Reciprocities and Tensions. 2010. Available from: http://enculturation. gmu.edu/achieving-creative-integrity

[36] Brown GR. The blue line on thin ice: Police use of force modifications in the era of camera phones and YouTube. The British Journal of Criminology.

[37] Howard PN. The Arab Spring's Cascading Effects. Pacific Standard: The Science of Society. 2011. Available from: http://www.psmag.com/navigation/ politics-and-law/the-cascading-effectsof-the-arab-spring-28575/ [Accessed:

[38] Emruli S, Zejneli T, Agai F. YouTube

[39] Lian HF. "Us" versus "them": An ideological battle for electorates on political YouTube videos in the 2016 Sarawak state election. Contemporary

[40] Kellner D, Kim G. YouTube, critical pedagogy, and media activism. Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural

[42] Freidson E. Professionalism Reborn: Theory, Prophecy, and Policy. Chicago: University of Chicago press; 1994. p. 17

Southeast Asia: A Journal of International and Strategic Affairs.

Studies. 2010;**32**(1):3-36

Sciences. 2013;**13**:139-147

[43] Hamada B. Social Media: A Turning Point into Global Journalism Identity and Ethics. In: Višňovský J, Radošinská J, editors. Social Media and

[41] Bosshart SG, Schoenhagen P. Amateurs striving for news production. Can they compete with professional journalism? Studies in Communication

and political communication— Macedonian case. International Journal of Computer Science Issues.

[Accessed: 02 January 2015]

2016;**56**(2):293-312

03 January 2015]

2011;**8**(4):46-466

2018;**40**(1):27-49

*Do Independent Arab YouTube Broadcasters "Broadcast Themselves"? The Saudi Case Explored DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.84793*

[35] Lange PT. Achieving Creative Integrity on Youtube: Reciprocities and Tensions. 2010. Available from: http://enculturation. gmu.edu/achieving-creative-integrity [Accessed: 02 January 2015]

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

[27] Kwak H, Lee C, Park H, Moon S. What is Twitter, A Social Network or a News Media? In: Proceedings of the 19th International Conference on World Wide Web. 2010. pp. 591-600. Available

from: http://dl.acm.org/citation. cfm?id=1772751 [Accessed: 03 January

[28] Pingree RJ. How messages affect their senders: A more general model of message effects and implications for deliberation. Communication Theory.

2015]

2007;**17**(4):439-461

[29] Zúñiga HG, Molyneux L, Zheng P. Social media, political expression, and political participation:

Panel analysis of lagged and

[30] Grönlund A. ICT is not participation, is not democracy: eParticipation development models revisited. In: Macintosh A, Tambouris E, editors. ePart 2009. Vol. 5694. Heidelberg: Springer; 2009. pp. 12-23

[31] Gauntlett D. Making Is

Polity Press; 2011

McGraw-Hill; 2013

693-714

Connecting: The Social Meaning of Creativity, from DIY and Knitting to YouTube and Web 2.0. Cambridge:

[32] Miles J. YouTube Marketing Ower: How to Use Video to Find More Prospects, Launch Your Products, and Reach a Massive Audience. New York:

[33] Haridakis P, Hanson G. Social interaction and co-viewing with YouTube: Blending mass communication reception and social connection. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media. 2009;**53**(2):317-335

[34] Madden A, Ruthven I, McMenemy D. A classification scheme for content analyses of YouTube video comments. Journal of Documentation. 2013;**69**(5):

concurrent relationships. Journal of Communication. 2014;**64**(4):612-634

Future%20of%20Television.pdf [Accessed: 24 December 2014]

[19] Simonsen TM. Categorizing YouTube. MedieKultur: Journal of Media and Communication Research.

[20] Rich M. OTT Breaks out of Its Netflix Shell. 2017. Available from: https://www.comscore.com/Insights/ Blog/OTT-Breaks-Out-of-Its-Netflix-Shell [Accessed: 11 November 2018]

[21] Shih G. Analysis: YouTube Alienates Amateur Users by Courting Pros; San Francisco: Reuters. 2012. Available from: http://www.reuters.com/

article/2012/10/04/us-youtube-cultureidUSBRE8931K420121004 [Accessed:

imc/2007/papers/imc131.pdf [Accessed:

Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything. New York:

[24] Kim J. User-generated content (UGC) revolution?: Critique of the promise of YouTube [PhD (doctor of philosophy) thesis]. Iowa: Iowa State University; 2010. Available from http://ir.uiowa.edu/cgi/viewcontent. cgi?article=1714&context=etd [Accessed: 24 December 2014]

[25] Miller K. Playing Along: Digital Games, YouTube and Virtual

Performance. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press; 2012

[26] Soukup PA. Looking at, with, and through YouTube™. Communication Research Trends. 2014;**33**(3):3-34

[22] Cha M, Kwak H, Rodriguez P, Ahn YY, Moon S. I Tube, You Tube, Everybody Tubes: Analyzing the World's Largest User Generated Content Video System. IMC'07. 2007. Available from: http://conferences.sigcomm.org/

2011;**27**(51):72-93

03 January 2015]

25 December 2014]

Portfolio; 2006

[23] Tapscott D, Williams A.

**134**

[36] Brown GR. The blue line on thin ice: Police use of force modifications in the era of camera phones and YouTube. The British Journal of Criminology. 2016;**56**(2):293-312

[37] Howard PN. The Arab Spring's Cascading Effects. Pacific Standard: The Science of Society. 2011. Available from: http://www.psmag.com/navigation/ politics-and-law/the-cascading-effectsof-the-arab-spring-28575/ [Accessed: 03 January 2015]

[38] Emruli S, Zejneli T, Agai F. YouTube and political communication— Macedonian case. International Journal of Computer Science Issues. 2011;**8**(4):46-466

[39] Lian HF. "Us" versus "them": An ideological battle for electorates on political YouTube videos in the 2016 Sarawak state election. Contemporary Southeast Asia: A Journal of International and Strategic Affairs. 2018;**40**(1):27-49

[40] Kellner D, Kim G. YouTube, critical pedagogy, and media activism. Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies. 2010;**32**(1):3-36

[41] Bosshart SG, Schoenhagen P. Amateurs striving for news production. Can they compete with professional journalism? Studies in Communication Sciences. 2013;**13**:139-147

[42] Freidson E. Professionalism Reborn: Theory, Prophecy, and Policy. Chicago: University of Chicago press; 1994. p. 17

[43] Hamada B. Social Media: A Turning Point into Global Journalism Identity and Ethics. In: Višňovský J, Radošinská J, editors. Social Media and Journalism: Trends, Connections, and Implications. London: IntechOpen; 2018. p. 40. Available from: https:// www.intechopen.com/books/ social-media-and-journalismtrends-connections-implications/ social-media-a-turning-point-intoglobal-journalism-identity-and-ethics [Accessed: 18 December 2018]

[44] Dijck JV. Users like you? Theorizing agency in user-generated content. Media, Culture and Society. 2009;**3**(1):41-58

[45] Freedom House. Freedom in the World. 2017. Available from: https:// freedomhouse.org/report/fiw-2017 table-country-scores [Accessed: 10 November 2018]

[46] Marghalani K, Palmgreen P, Boyd D. The utilization of direct satellite broadcasting (DBS) in Saudi Arabia. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media. 1998;**42**(3):297-317

[47] PBS. Frontline. 2015. Available from: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/ frontline/shows/saudi/etc/cron.html [Accessed: 04 January 2015]

[48] Sakr N. Whys and Wherefores of Satellite Channel Oownership. 2001. Available from: http://acc.teachmideast. org/texts.php?module\_id=13&reading\_ id=1029&sequence=3 [Accessed: 01 January 2015]

[49] Zittrain J, Edelman B. Documentation of Internet Filtering in Saudi Arabia. 2002. Available from: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/filtering/ saudiarabia/ [Accessed: 02 January 2015]

[50] Reporters Without Borders. 2008. Available from: http://en.rsf.org/ saudi-arabia-blogger-fouad-al-farhanfreed-28-04-2008,26746 [Accessed: 04 January 2015]

[51] Internet World Stats. Middle East. 2018. Available from: https://www.

internetworldstats.com/stats5.htm [Accessed: 10 November 2018]

[52] Alosaimi N. Online Campaign to Protect Girls from Scandals. Arab News. 2008. Available from: http://www. arabnews.com/node/310594 [Accessed: 27 December 2014]

[53] Ayed N. Why Saudi Arabia is the World's Top YouTube Nation; CBCNews. 2013. Available from: http://www.cbc. ca/news/world/nahlah-ayed-why-saudiarabia-is-the-world-s-top-youtubenation-1.1359187 [Accessed: 02 January 2015]

[54] Ministry of Communications and Information Technology. Telecommunication Indicators in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia by the End of Q3-2017. 2017. Available from: https://www.mcit.gov.sa/en/ standard-indicators/99050 [Accessed: 11 November 2018]

[55] Radcliffe D. 5 Key Developments in the MENA Digital Space. Your Middle East. 2014. Available from: http://www. yourmiddleeast.com/business/5-keydevelopments-in-the-mena-digitalspace\_19507 [Accessed: 08 January 2015]

[56] Ghedin G. Digital in the Round. YouTube and the Middle East: The Story of 6 Arab Web Superstars. 2014. Available from: http://www. digitalintheround.com/youtube-arabweb-stars/ [Accessed: 05 Janurary 2015]

[57] Daoudi O. YouTube-based programming and the Saudi Youth: Exploring the economic, political, and cultural context of YouTube in Saudi Arabia [Doctoral dissertation]. Glasgo: University of Glasgow; 2018. p. 157. Available from: http://theses. gla.ac.uk/9004/7/2018DaoudiPhD.pdf [Accessed: 19 Decempber 2018]

[58] YouTube. Creator Blog: Additional Changes to the YouTube Partner Program (YPP) to Better Protect

Creators. 2018. Available from: https://youtube-creators.googleblog. com/2018/01/additional-changesto-youtube-partner.html [Accessed: 14 November 2018]

[59] Vadehra P. Production: Interview with Kaswara Alkhatib. Digitalstudiome. com. 2018. Available from: https:// www.digitalstudiome.com/article-11542-interview-with-kaswara-alkhatib [Accessed: 15 November 2018]

[60] Meyer R. U.S. Court: Bloggers are Journalists. The Atlantic. 2014. Available from: https://www.theatlantic.com/ technology/archive/2014/01/us-courtbloggers-are-journalists/283225/ [Accessed: 19 December 2018]

[61] Human Rights Watch. Saudi Arabia: Thousands Held Arbitrarily—Dramatic Increase in Detention Without Trial. 2018. Available from: https://www.hrw. org/news/2018/05/06/saudi-arabiathousands-held-arbitrarily# [Accessed: 19 December 2018]

[62] Muller E. Where quality matters: Discuourses on the art of making a YouTube video. In: Snickars P, editor. YouTube Reader. Lithuania: Logotipas; 2009. pp. 126-139

[63] Uldam J, Askanius T. Online civic cultures: Debating climate change activism on YouTube. International Journal of Communication. 2014;**7**:1185-1204

[64] Gunkel D. Second thoughts: Toward a critique of the digital divide. New Media & Society. 2003;**5**(4):499-520

[65] Soderberg J. Determining social change: The role of technological determinism in the collective action framing of hackers. New Media & Society. 2013;**15**(8):1277-1293

[66] Murphie A, Potts J. Culture and Technology. London: Palgrave; 2003. p. 21

**137**

1

NGO, Researchers.

**Chapter 8**

**Abstract**

**1. Introduction**

*Akmel Meless Siméon*

rooting of democracy in sub-Saharan Africa.

thorny problem that concerns many actors.1

**Keywords:** power management, democratic deficit,

Management of Political Power

Africa: A Solution Outline

and Consequences in Sub-Saharan

The objective of this study is to analyse the management of political power and its consequences in sub-Saharan Africa. To achieve this, we have been interested in two countries of the subregion, Burkina Faso and Mali, because of demonstrations, repressions and crises linked to elections. The study also concerns the *Odjukru* society, because it has a democratic political system. Both qualitative and quantitative works present the results of the field. It explains the democratic deficit through corruption, despotism, arbitrary arrests, etc. The study also analyses the consequences of poor governance (health and agro-economic problems). It finally describes a traditional *Odjukru* institution, *Ɛb-eb*, and shows how it can help in the

traditional democratic institution (*Ɛb-eb*), consequence, sub-Saharan Africa

This article deals with the management of power and its consequences in sub-Saharan Africa. The matter of the administration of the city in Africa is a

the people of sub-Saharan Africa, fresh out of the colonial yoke, showed their joy. Unfortunately this enthusiasm turned into a nightmare, as some leaders chose to perpetuate themselves in power bypassing democratic rules. Also, the repression and the gerrymandering of the constitutions have become a mode of management, thus causing socio-political crises. To this situation, the coups of states, the rigging of elections, tribalism and other ills that plague African societies have been added. On this issue, Igue [1] shows that African countries with enlightened leadership have undergone advanced development, while those who are immersed in obscurantism languish in poverty and victims of poor management of the city. Lopes [2] portrays the situation of discomfort experienced by the people, through the mythical history of a veteran, who made war in Algeria in the year 1960. Returning to the country, he went into rebellion and took part in a coup organized by young officers. He was appointed Minister of Defence and had great ambitions in this post, when

he was suddenly sent as ambassador to Algeria by a ministerial reshuffle.

In the aftermath of independence,

#### **Chapter 8**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

Creators. 2018. Available from: https://youtube-creators.googleblog. com/2018/01/additional-changesto-youtube-partner.html [Accessed:

[59] Vadehra P. Production: Interview with Kaswara Alkhatib. Digitalstudiome. com. 2018. Available from: https:// www.digitalstudiome.com/article-11542-interview-with-kaswara-alkhatib

[60] Meyer R. U.S. Court: Bloggers are Journalists. The Atlantic. 2014. Available from: https://www.theatlantic.com/ technology/archive/2014/01/us-courtbloggers-are-journalists/283225/ [Accessed: 19 December 2018]

[61] Human Rights Watch. Saudi Arabia: Thousands Held Arbitrarily—Dramatic Increase in Detention Without Trial. 2018. Available from: https://www.hrw. org/news/2018/05/06/saudi-arabiathousands-held-arbitrarily# [Accessed:

[62] Muller E. Where quality matters: Discuourses on the art of making a YouTube video. In: Snickars P, editor. YouTube Reader. Lithuania: Logotipas;

[63] Uldam J, Askanius T. Online civic cultures: Debating climate change activism on YouTube. International

[64] Gunkel D. Second thoughts: Toward a critique of the digital divide. New Media & Society. 2003;**5**(4):499-520

[65] Soderberg J. Determining social change: The role of technological determinism in the collective action framing of hackers. New Media & Society. 2013;**15**(8):1277-1293

[66] Murphie A, Potts J. Culture and Technology. London: Palgrave; 2003.

Journal of Communication.

[Accessed: 15 November 2018]

14 November 2018]

19 December 2018]

2009. pp. 126-139

2014;**7**:1185-1204

p. 21

internetworldstats.com/stats5.htm [Accessed: 10 November 2018]

[52] Alosaimi N. Online Campaign to Protect Girls from Scandals. Arab News. 2008. Available from: http://www. arabnews.com/node/310594 [Accessed:

[53] Ayed N. Why Saudi Arabia is the World's Top YouTube Nation; CBCNews. 2013. Available from: http://www.cbc. ca/news/world/nahlah-ayed-why-saudiarabia-is-the-world-s-top-youtubenation-1.1359187 [Accessed: 02 January

[54] Ministry of Communications and Information Technology. Telecommunication Indicators in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia by the End of Q3-2017. 2017. Available from: https://www.mcit.gov.sa/en/ standard-indicators/99050 [Accessed:

[55] Radcliffe D. 5 Key Developments in the MENA Digital Space. Your Middle East. 2014. Available from: http://www. yourmiddleeast.com/business/5-keydevelopments-in-the-mena-digitalspace\_19507 [Accessed: 08 January 2015]

[56] Ghedin G. Digital in the Round. YouTube and the Middle East: The Story of 6 Arab Web Superstars. 2014. Available from: http://www. digitalintheround.com/youtube-arabweb-stars/ [Accessed: 05 Janurary 2015]

[57] Daoudi O. YouTube-based programming and the Saudi Youth: Exploring the economic, political, and cultural context of YouTube in Saudi Arabia [Doctoral dissertation]. Glasgo: University of Glasgow; 2018. p. 157. Available from: http://theses. gla.ac.uk/9004/7/2018DaoudiPhD.pdf [Accessed: 19 Decempber 2018]

[58] YouTube. Creator Blog: Additional Changes to the YouTube Partner Program (YPP) to Better Protect

27 December 2014]

11 November 2018]

2015]

**136**

## Management of Political Power and Consequences in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Solution Outline

*Akmel Meless Siméon*

#### **Abstract**

The objective of this study is to analyse the management of political power and its consequences in sub-Saharan Africa. To achieve this, we have been interested in two countries of the subregion, Burkina Faso and Mali, because of demonstrations, repressions and crises linked to elections. The study also concerns the *Odjukru* society, because it has a democratic political system. Both qualitative and quantitative works present the results of the field. It explains the democratic deficit through corruption, despotism, arbitrary arrests, etc. The study also analyses the consequences of poor governance (health and agro-economic problems). It finally describes a traditional *Odjukru* institution, *Ɛb-eb*, and shows how it can help in the rooting of democracy in sub-Saharan Africa.

**Keywords:** power management, democratic deficit, traditional democratic institution (*Ɛb-eb*), consequence, sub-Saharan Africa

#### **1. Introduction**

This article deals with the management of power and its consequences in sub-Saharan Africa. The matter of the administration of the city in Africa is a thorny problem that concerns many actors.1 In the aftermath of independence, the people of sub-Saharan Africa, fresh out of the colonial yoke, showed their joy. Unfortunately this enthusiasm turned into a nightmare, as some leaders chose to perpetuate themselves in power bypassing democratic rules. Also, the repression and the gerrymandering of the constitutions have become a mode of management, thus causing socio-political crises. To this situation, the coups of states, the rigging of elections, tribalism and other ills that plague African societies have been added. On this issue, Igue [1] shows that African countries with enlightened leadership have undergone advanced development, while those who are immersed in obscurantism languish in poverty and victims of poor management of the city. Lopes [2] portrays the situation of discomfort experienced by the people, through the mythical history of a veteran, who made war in Algeria in the year 1960. Returning to the country, he went into rebellion and took part in a coup organized by young officers. He was appointed Minister of Defence and had great ambitions in this post, when he was suddenly sent as ambassador to Algeria by a ministerial reshuffle.

<sup>1</sup> NGO, Researchers.

Mali and Burkina Faso, which live at the pace of independent (modern) countries, are facing the same situation, which is not the case for traditional societies, including *Lodjukru*. These communities are of interest to the study for several reasons:


To this research question, the following questions are related are related to secondary issues: "What are the determinants of the democratic deficit?" "What are the consequences for people?" "What strategy do *Odjukru* use to stabilize their cities?" The objective of this study is to explain the poor governance and the role of *Ɛb-eb* in democratic management in sub-Saharan Africa. The thesis supported is "The traditional institution *Odjukru* can contribute to good governance in the countries of sub-Saharan Africa".

Burkina Faso,2 Mali3 and *Lodjukru*<sup>4</sup> are our areas of investigation. The choice of these localities is linked to political instability (repeated coups, repressions of demonstrations, etc.) on the one hand, and the existence of a traditional, saving democratic institution is unknown on the other hand. Respondents are selected according to the criteria including availability, knowledge of crises and their consequences. We have made a sensible choice, because we are talking about targeting the resource people who are able to educate us more. In total, 102 respondents, men and women, are concerned with the study. The documentary analysis, the semi-directive interview and the questionnaire were mobilized to collect the information. The deepening of the results necessitated dialectic and comparative methods to understand the persistence of socio-political crises. The theory of resilience allows, through the traditional institution (*Ɛb-eb*), to circumvent the evil governance in sub-Saharan Africa.

#### **2. The democratic deficit and its consequences in the study areas**

#### **2.1 The determinants of the democratic deficit**

This part of the study identifies the factors related to poor governance. To achieve this, we approached the respondents in these terms: "Why do crises persist in your country?" "What are the disadvantages?" Here are some of the answers obtained:

**139**

<sup>5</sup> T.C, Teacher, 42 years old, Malian. <sup>6</sup> A.Y, State agent, 33 years old, Burkinabé. <sup>7</sup> D.L, Trading agent, 51 years old, Malian.

<sup>9</sup> National Union of students of Mali.

<sup>8</sup> P.H, health worker, 40 years old, Burkinabé ; M.K, Teacher, 50 years old, Malian.

*Management of Political Power and Consequences in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Solution Outline*

Before coming to power, politicians hold sycophancy words. But when they're elected, they make it their own. The people so pampered do not represent anything to their eyes. When they have to leave, it is the refusal and we drag in power.5 Today, history gives reason to this Frenchman and it is a pity. Africa is really not ripe for democracy. People who consider themselves to be intellectuals and the future of the country behave like vulgar characters. And that is unfortunate. It's

The question arises as to whether the politicians are in power for us or not. They look at themselves as earthenware dogs. They're interested in their belly. We use the people as sheep of panurge. People are standing up against each other for petty interests; if not how to understand the socio-political crisis? While some are enriched,

The country is champion in this matter, all because politicians are obsessed by power for power. Violence thus becomes a means of accession to power. The consequences are dramatic. Everywhere, there are deaths, the wounded, the destruction of public buildings, the mass displacement of people, famine and other disasters. In addition, favouritism, corruption, poor governance and unemployment are common to

• The first component concerns the determinants of the democratic deficit. Through the written, oral and lived experiences, we distinguish the coups of states and the authoritarian drifts. The facts concur and confirm our assertion. In Mali, the first coup d'etat was recorded in 1968. Becoming president, the power of Kamani has turned into a single authoritarian party. He had a constitution adopted by "referendum" in 1969 and tolerated only one party, his US-RDA. In order to prevent possible subversions, leaders have set up popular militias framed by the party, which unfortunately is gnawed, 3 years later by internal quarrels. The promises of departure have turned into illusions, because they have never been respected. Taking advantage of the deteriorating socio-political situation and economic difficulties, a coup d'état led by young officers of the Malian army overthrew Kamani on 19 November 1968 [3]. After their seizure of power, the putschists abolished the constitution and founded the Military Committee for National Liberation (CMLN), which became the supreme organ of the country. In the days following the putsch, Moussa Traoré, a strong new man, promised in a communiqué a democratic regime, individual freedoms, trade unions, multipartism and free elections [4]. Instead, it is authoritarianism, dictatorship during the 23 years of management of power without sharing the reign of terror. Moussa Traoré adopted a new constitution on 2 June 1974 by referendum with the Stalinist score of 99% of the votes. He imposes the passage to the Second Republic and endowed the country with a single party, a national assembly and a president elected by universal suffrage for 5 years, which was already all found. No contradiction was tolerated. Annoying political opponents were arrested and eliminated. Thus, after his arrest and detention in Kidal (northeast), Keïta died on 16 May 1977, at the age of 62 years, under dubious circumstances. Yarra Dhar suffered the same fate in 1973. On 16 March 1980, the general secretary of the UNEEM,9

We do not talk about the force shots.

Abdoul

The analysis stems from two comments:

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85998*

the housewife's basket shrinks considerably.7

African countries without exception.8

power for power. Even if they are unpopular, they still cling.6

<sup>2</sup> Independent country since 5 August 1960 under the name of Upper Volta and renamed Burkina Faso in 1984; Surface: 274 200 km²; Population: 19 512 533 inhabitants (en 2016); Capital Ouagadougou.

<sup>3</sup> Independent country since 22 September 1960; Surface: 1 241 238 km²; Population: 14.5 million inhabitants (en 2010); Capital: Bamako.

<sup>4</sup> Lower Cote d'Ivoire ; Surface: 2260 km²; Population: 148874 inhabitants; Chief Place: Dabou.

#### *Management of Political Power and Consequences in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Solution Outline DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85998*

Before coming to power, politicians hold sycophancy words. But when they're elected, they make it their own. The people so pampered do not represent anything to their eyes. When they have to leave, it is the refusal and we drag in power.5

Today, history gives reason to this Frenchman and it is a pity. Africa is really not ripe for democracy. People who consider themselves to be intellectuals and the future of the country behave like vulgar characters. And that is unfortunate. It's power for power. Even if they are unpopular, they still cling.6

The question arises as to whether the politicians are in power for us or not. They look at themselves as earthenware dogs. They're interested in their belly. We use the people as sheep of panurge. People are standing up against each other for petty interests; if not how to understand the socio-political crisis? While some are enriched, the housewife's basket shrinks considerably.7 We do not talk about the force shots. The country is champion in this matter, all because politicians are obsessed by power for power. Violence thus becomes a means of accession to power. The consequences are dramatic. Everywhere, there are deaths, the wounded, the destruction of public buildings, the mass displacement of people, famine and other disasters. In addition, favouritism, corruption, poor governance and unemployment are common to African countries without exception.8 The analysis stems from two comments:

• The first component concerns the determinants of the democratic deficit. Through the written, oral and lived experiences, we distinguish the coups of states and the authoritarian drifts. The facts concur and confirm our assertion. In Mali, the first coup d'etat was recorded in 1968. Becoming president, the power of Kamani has turned into a single authoritarian party. He had a constitution adopted by "referendum" in 1969 and tolerated only one party, his US-RDA. In order to prevent possible subversions, leaders have set up popular militias framed by the party, which unfortunately is gnawed, 3 years later by internal quarrels. The promises of departure have turned into illusions, because they have never been respected. Taking advantage of the deteriorating socio-political situation and economic difficulties, a coup d'état led by young officers of the Malian army overthrew Kamani on 19 November 1968 [3]. After their seizure of power, the putschists abolished the constitution and founded the Military Committee for National Liberation (CMLN), which became the supreme organ of the country. In the days following the putsch, Moussa Traoré, a strong new man, promised in a communiqué a democratic regime, individual freedoms, trade unions, multipartism and free elections [4]. Instead, it is authoritarianism, dictatorship during the 23 years of management of power without sharing the reign of terror. Moussa Traoré adopted a new constitution on 2 June 1974 by referendum with the Stalinist score of 99% of the votes. He imposes the passage to the Second Republic and endowed the country with a single party, a national assembly and a president elected by universal suffrage for 5 years, which was already all found. No contradiction was tolerated. Annoying political opponents were arrested and eliminated. Thus, after his arrest and detention in Kidal (northeast), Keïta died on 16 May 1977, at the age of 62 years, under dubious circumstances. Yarra Dhar suffered the same fate in 1973. On 16 March 1980, the general secretary of the UNEEM,9 Abdoul

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

Saharan Africa particularly in those countries.

countries of sub-Saharan Africa".

Mali3

**2.1 The determinants of the democratic deficit**

and *Lodjukru*<sup>4</sup>

Burkina Faso,2

*Lodjukru*. These communities are of interest to the study for several reasons:

Mali and Burkina Faso, which live at the pace of independent (modern) countries, are facing the same situation, which is not the case for traditional societies, including

• The existence of a democratic deficit. In fact, repeated crises, conflicts, ethnic wars, confiscation of power, arbitrary imprisonment, corruption, health and agro-economic problems indicate that democracy is heavily rooted in sub-

• *Ɛb-eb*, an instrument of good governance. In the *Lodjukru*, power is passed down from generation to generation without competition and without violence, in a peaceful way, which justifies the stability of the city. The *Ɛb-eb*, a traditional democratic institution, appears as a blueprint for a solution to poor governance in the countries of sub-Saharan Africa. From these observations follows a series of questions from a series of questions, the main one being "How can *Ɛb-eb*, a traditional *Odjukru* institution, address the democratic deficit, which has caused adverse consequences in sub-Saharan Africa?"

To this research question, the following questions are related are related to secondary issues: "What are the determinants of the democratic deficit?" "What are the consequences for people?" "What strategy do *Odjukru* use to stabilize their cities?" The objective of this study is to explain the poor governance and the role of *Ɛb-eb* in democratic management in sub-Saharan Africa. The thesis supported is "The traditional institution *Odjukru* can contribute to good governance in the

these localities is linked to political instability (repeated coups, repressions of demonstrations, etc.) on the one hand, and the existence of a traditional, saving democratic institution is unknown on the other hand. Respondents are selected according to the criteria including availability, knowledge of crises and their consequences. We have made a sensible choice, because we are talking about targeting the resource people who are able to educate us more. In total, 102 respondents, men and women, are concerned with the study. The documentary analysis, the semi-directive interview and the questionnaire were mobilized to collect the information. The deepening of the results necessitated dialectic and comparative methods to understand the persistence of socio-political crises. The theory of resilience allows, through the traditional

institution (*Ɛb-eb*), to circumvent the evil governance in sub-Saharan Africa.

**2. The democratic deficit and its consequences in the study areas**

This part of the study identifies the factors related to poor governance. To achieve this, we approached the respondents in these terms: "Why do crises persist in your country?" "What are the disadvantages?" Here are some of the answers

<sup>2</sup> Independent country since 5 August 1960 under the name of Upper Volta and renamed Burkina Faso in

1984; Surface: 274 200 km²; Population: 19 512 533 inhabitants (en 2016); Capital Ouagadougou. <sup>3</sup> Independent country since 22 September 1960; Surface: 1 241 238 km²; Population: 14.5 million inhabit-

<sup>4</sup> Lower Cote d'Ivoire ; Surface: 2260 km²; Population: 148874 inhabitants; Chief Place: Dabou.

are our areas of investigation. The choice of

**138**

obtained:

ants (en 2010); Capital: Bamako.

<sup>5</sup> T.C, Teacher, 42 years old, Malian.

<sup>6</sup> A.Y, State agent, 33 years old, Burkinabé.

<sup>7</sup> D.L, Trading agent, 51 years old, Malian.

<sup>8</sup> P.H, health worker, 40 years old, Burkinabé ; M.K, Teacher, 50 years old, Malian.

<sup>9</sup> National Union of students of Mali.

Karim Camara, better known as "Cabral", was arrested. On 22 March 1991, during the demonstrations organized in his memory, the situation escalated. Lieutenant-Colonel Amadou Touré (ATT) overthrew Moussa Traoré [5], who became president in 2002, but was deposed in 2012 before the end of his term by Captain Amadou Haya Salah, "third coup of state" [6].

Burkina Faso, "the country of men with integrity", was not spared. Indeed, on 3 January 1966, 6 years after the independence of the country, Maurice Yaméogo, the first president of the Republic of Upper Volta, was overthrown by Abdoulaye Sangoulé Lamizana, who was in turn deposited on 25 November 1980 by Colonel Sayé Zerbo. On 7 November 1982, Doctor-Commander Jean Baptiste Ouedraogo overturned Sayé Zerbo and became the head of the state at the helm of the People's Salvation Committee. Thomas Sankara laid down Jean Baptiste Ouedraogo on 4 August 1983. On 15 October 1987, Thomas Sankara was overthrown by soldiers under the direction of Captain Blaise Compaoré, his brother-in-arms. He died in circumstances not yet elucidated. He fell, following a popular uprising on 31 October 2014. On the night of September 16 to 17, 2015, Gilbert Diendéré took the lead of a coup of state and evicted the president of the transition Michel Kafando, before returning power, following the external pressures [7].

These data raise the issue of governance in African countries. Indeed, democracy borrowed from the West is being harmed, because the principles attached to it are trampled on by leaders. Of the Greek demos (people) and kratos (power, authority), democracy generally refers to the political regime whose principle is that of the government of the people by the people and for the people [8]. He is the only legitimate holder of sovereignty, absolute and perpetual power, which he delegates to representatives through elections, with a view to better management of the state. Democracy is based on fundamental principles, including individual freedom, which is a right of everyone, to act independently without arbitrary measures. In the context of the study, freedom of opinion is not always respected. Yet at the international level, it is associated with freedom of expression and is the subject of Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) [9]:

*Every individual has the right to freedom of opinion and expression, which implies the right not to be concerned for his opinions and that of seeking, receiving and disseminating, without considerations of borders, information and ideas by any means of expression whatsoever.*

The claims of the freedoms are confiscated, though protests are constantly banned and suppressed in blood, which reaches the spirit of democracy. If this fundamental right is flouted, the electoral challenges also confirm the democratic deficit in those countries. Inseparable from democracy, election became a democratic rite [10]. It is the subject of international recognition, as the right to take part in the public affairs' branch of its country, either directly or through freely chosen representatives, is included in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.10

In many countries such as Mali, voices are rising11 to denounce unsavoury practices aimed at the rigging of elections. Civil society and NGOs are inviting themselves into the debate in order to ensure transparency in the elections [11]. This situation raises the question of the credibility of the results in Africa.

**141**

*Management of Political Power and Consequences in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Solution Outline*

In the aftermath of independence, in the single party, elections were everywhere supervised by the Ministry of the Interior, which had the possibility of filling the ballot boxes and thus manipulating the data. We therefore understand the Soviet or Stalinist scores proclaimed after the elections (99.98%) in countries of the subregion. The practices and strategies for confiscating power have not changed war today. More than 50 years after independence, the so-called independent electoral commissions having replaced the Ministry of the Interior are corrupt, which justifies the challenges at each deadline. This practice violates one of the fundamental principles of the separation of powers enunciated by Montesquieu [12]: In order to be able not to abuse power, it is necessary that, by the disposition of things, power

*The electoral litigation yesterday revered, today electoral litigation yesterday revered, today is in trial. Indeed, instead of being a factor of appeasement of conflicts by an impartial settlement of electoral disputes, it offers the image of a field mined by corruption with an dependence on politics and jurisprudence on "eclipses". This "indecent" environment has created a public disaffection with regard to electoral litigation. This explains, moreover, the involvement of the international community in the process whose processes in place to guarantee electoral credibility and peace roughly compete with the electoral litigation with mixed successes [13].*

Since 2000, elections have been held in almost all African countries. The existence of formal electoral processes does not prevent certain family dynasties from persisting. In addition, many elections are fraught with violence, and election crises can sometimes be resolved only by unsatisfactory power-sharing agreements [14]. Excerpts from newspapers confirm the reservations concerning the credibility of

Legislative annulment in Divo and Kouibly: The Constitutional Council and the

*Ex-vice president of the CIS angry after his defeat: A major fraud team led by a* 

*24 h after the decisions of the Constitutional Council, a former vice-president of* 

Babo [18] also questioned the need to hold presidential elections in Africa. For him, a question of the political model imposed by the West, too costly in money and

• The second remark concerns the impact of poor governance on the society.

Numerous in the study areas, they are perceptible at the social and agroeconomic level. The respondent's words are eloquent, because they summarize the

*We don't talk about the force shots. The country is champion in this matter, all because politicians are obsessed by power for power. Violence thus becomes a means of accession to power. The consequences are dramatic. The deaths, the wounded, the destruction of public buildings, the mass displacement of populations, the famine and the emergence of metabolic diseases (diabetes, vascular heart accident,* 

*trio of ministers has settled. I do not intend to fly [16].*

**2.2 The consequences of the democratic deficit**

dramatic situation caused by evil governance:

*the CEI: it is an electoral scandal, of the ministers accused [17].*

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85998*

the results of the electoral commissions.

CIS reject the fault [15]:

in life, is necessary.

should stop power:

<sup>10</sup> Article 21.1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

<sup>11</sup> The Observatory for elections and good governance, a Malian NGO that has developed an expertise in the electoral field and good democratic governance since 1996.

*Management of Political Power and Consequences in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Solution Outline DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85998*

In the aftermath of independence, in the single party, elections were everywhere supervised by the Ministry of the Interior, which had the possibility of filling the ballot boxes and thus manipulating the data. We therefore understand the Soviet or Stalinist scores proclaimed after the elections (99.98%) in countries of the subregion. The practices and strategies for confiscating power have not changed war today. More than 50 years after independence, the so-called independent electoral commissions having replaced the Ministry of the Interior are corrupt, which justifies the challenges at each deadline. This practice violates one of the fundamental principles of the separation of powers enunciated by Montesquieu [12]: In order to be able not to abuse power, it is necessary that, by the disposition of things, power should stop power:

*The electoral litigation yesterday revered, today electoral litigation yesterday revered, today is in trial. Indeed, instead of being a factor of appeasement of conflicts by an impartial settlement of electoral disputes, it offers the image of a field mined by corruption with an dependence on politics and jurisprudence on "eclipses". This "indecent" environment has created a public disaffection with regard to electoral litigation. This explains, moreover, the involvement of the international community in the process whose processes in place to guarantee electoral credibility and peace roughly compete with the electoral litigation with mixed successes [13].*

Since 2000, elections have been held in almost all African countries. The existence of formal electoral processes does not prevent certain family dynasties from persisting. In addition, many elections are fraught with violence, and election crises can sometimes be resolved only by unsatisfactory power-sharing agreements [14]. Excerpts from newspapers confirm the reservations concerning the credibility of the results of the electoral commissions.

Legislative annulment in Divo and Kouibly: The Constitutional Council and the CIS reject the fault [15]:

*Ex-vice president of the CIS angry after his defeat: A major fraud team led by a trio of ministers has settled. I do not intend to fly [16].*

*24 h after the decisions of the Constitutional Council, a former vice-president of the CEI: it is an electoral scandal, of the ministers accused [17].*

Babo [18] also questioned the need to hold presidential elections in Africa. For him, a question of the political model imposed by the West, too costly in money and in life, is necessary.

• The second remark concerns the impact of poor governance on the society.

#### **2.2 The consequences of the democratic deficit**

Numerous in the study areas, they are perceptible at the social and agroeconomic level. The respondent's words are eloquent, because they summarize the dramatic situation caused by evil governance:

*We don't talk about the force shots. The country is champion in this matter, all because politicians are obsessed by power for power. Violence thus becomes a means of accession to power. The consequences are dramatic. The deaths, the wounded, the destruction of public buildings, the mass displacement of populations, the famine and the emergence of metabolic diseases (diabetes, vascular heart accident,* 

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

by Captain Amadou Haya Salah, "third coup of state" [6].

before returning power, following the external pressures [7].

Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) [9]:

*means of expression whatsoever.*

<sup>10</sup> Article 21.1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

the electoral field and good democratic governance since 1996.

Karim Camara, better known as "Cabral", was arrested. On 22 March 1991, during the demonstrations organized in his memory, the situation escalated. Lieutenant-Colonel Amadou Touré (ATT) overthrew Moussa Traoré [5], who became president in 2002, but was deposed in 2012 before the end of his term

Burkina Faso, "the country of men with integrity", was not spared. Indeed, on 3 January 1966, 6 years after the independence of the country, Maurice Yaméogo, the first president of the Republic of Upper Volta, was overthrown by Abdoulaye Sangoulé Lamizana, who was in turn deposited on 25 November 1980 by Colonel Sayé Zerbo. On 7 November 1982, Doctor-Commander Jean Baptiste Ouedraogo overturned Sayé Zerbo and became the head of the state at the helm of the People's Salvation Committee. Thomas Sankara laid down Jean Baptiste Ouedraogo on 4 August 1983. On 15 October 1987, Thomas Sankara was overthrown by soldiers under the direction of Captain Blaise Compaoré, his brother-in-arms. He died in circumstances not yet elucidated. He fell, following a popular uprising on 31 October 2014. On the night of September 16 to 17, 2015, Gilbert Diendéré took the lead of a coup of state and evicted the president of the transition Michel Kafando,

These data raise the issue of governance in African countries. Indeed, democracy borrowed from the West is being harmed, because the principles attached to it are trampled on by leaders. Of the Greek demos (people) and kratos (power, authority), democracy generally refers to the political regime whose principle is that of the government of the people by the people and for the people [8]. He is the only legitimate holder of sovereignty, absolute and perpetual power, which he delegates to representatives through elections, with a view to better management of the state. Democracy is based on fundamental principles, including individual freedom, which is a right of everyone, to act independently without arbitrary measures. In the context of the study, freedom of opinion is not always respected. Yet at the international level, it is associated with freedom of expression and is the subject of

*Every individual has the right to freedom of opinion and expression, which implies the right not to be concerned for his opinions and that of seeking, receiving and disseminating, without considerations of borders, information and ideas by any* 

The claims of the freedoms are confiscated, though protests are constantly banned and suppressed in blood, which reaches the spirit of democracy. If this fundamental right is flouted, the electoral challenges also confirm the democratic deficit in those countries. Inseparable from democracy, election became a democratic rite [10]. It is the subject of international recognition, as the right to take part in the public affairs' branch of its country, either directly or through freely chosen representatives, is included in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.10 In many countries such as Mali, voices are rising11 to denounce unsavoury practices aimed at the rigging of elections. Civil society and NGOs are inviting themselves into the debate in order to ensure transparency in the elections [11]. This situation raises the question of the credibility of the results in Africa.

<sup>11</sup> The Observatory for elections and good governance, a Malian NGO that has developed an expertise in

**140**

*high blood pressure). In addition, favouritism, corruption, poor governance and unemployment are common to African countries without exception.<sup>12</sup>*

The above data indicate the actual existence of discomfort situations. In Mali, Modibo Kéita died in detention under conditions never elucidated. Yoro Diakité13 and Abdoul Karim Camara14 suffered the same fate. In Burkina Faso, Thomas Sankara15 disappeared tragically. On 30 October 2014, tens of thousands of demonstrators descended into the suburbs of Ouagadougou [19].

The consequences of the democratic deficit are shared by several West African countries. This is the case with Côte d'ivoire. Indeed, the socio-political crisis of 19 September 2002 to 11 April 2011, linked to the frantic quest for power, has made more than 3000 deaths, not to mention the destruction of public and private property. Food, water, gas, deaths due to drug shortages and diseases such as typhoid and cholera are part of the disasters caused by the democratic deficit. Patients suffering from metabolic diseases (diabetes, stroke, hypertension) have seen their health worsen. Indeed, the complexity of the crisis, because of its political ramifications, has caused a situation of discomfort. An embargo by the European Union has suffocated the country. The health system has been deprived of medicines indispensable to the care of the sick. In the face of this difficulty, saturated emergencies are overwhelmed with patients. There are many families whose parents have relatives have succumbed to their illness due to lack of medication. These respondents confirm:

*During the crisis that shook our country after the 2010 presidential election, we saw a lot of disappointing things. The Westerners have caused the death of several patients with diabetes, hypertension, cardiac accident for nothing. How can one be foolish, to the point of being insensitive to the suffering of innocent people? An embargo on drugs is never seen before. Sick people died because of poorly enlightened politicians.16*

Peace is trampled underfoot leaving free field to hatred and interethnic conflicts fuelled by politicians guided by a single concern, power. The internal refugees and those who fled the violence to meet in Ghana, Guinea, Togo and Benin are counted by the thousands. The patients, victims of trauma, swarm in the health centres. Everyone for all, all for all, God for all or acting solidarity has given way to everyone for himself, God for all.

Rwanda had also suffered the agony of the democratic deficit [20]. The United Nations [21] estimates that about 800,000 people, mostly Tutsi, lost their lives during these 3 months. Those among the Hutus who showed solidarity with the Tutsis were killed as traitors to the Hutu cause. For a hundred of days, it was the fastest genocide in history and the largest in the number of deaths per day. The story of Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu was confused with that of Nigeria. Leader of the rebellion, he was for two and a half years (30 May 1967–8 January 1970) the self-proclaimed president of the secessionist region (Biafra) at the cost of hundreds of thousands of deaths [22].

If the dead are of life is recorded throughout Africa, the manifest willingness of some leaders to change the constitution in order to perpetuate themselves in power or position and their children as heirs also justifies the democratic deficit and its consequences:

**143**

*Management of Political Power and Consequences in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Solution Outline*

*In Africa, however, it is generally difficult to admit that the Constitution, even a liberal one, guarantees democratic life. The rulers seem to be above the constitutions they despise, as they do of the peoples they govern. They seem to be accountable only to old metropolises and international institutions. The diagnosis of evil has already* 

The force shots negatively affected the agriculture and the economy of these countries. In Burkina Faso, as it was to be expected, the force shot perpetrated on 17 September 2015 by the National Council for Democracy (CND) had many economic repercussions due to the cessation of activities in 10 days. According to the Extraordinary Council of Ministers of 28 September 2015, the losses amount to more than 50 billion FCFA. As a result, the government must turn to the partners to fill this gap, in order to close the budget year and to face the new challenges engendered by the coup. The elections scheduled in October 2015 were no longer relevant. The government intends to step up security measures. The extension of the transition already seems in the line of fire. According to the government, the force shot led to adverse consequences. If there are losses in human lives and social injuries, the general strike of the workers has led to the paralysis of all activities at the economic level, for several days. The work stoppage caused a slowdown in production in the business sectors, particularly the secondary and tertiary sectors, with direct consequences of less than 0.3% growth on public finances. According to the figures provided by the Minister of Economy and Finance, in terms of taxes, the recovery losses incurred during the coup period were estimated at about 11 billion CFA francs. In terms of customs revenue, they are estimated at about CFAF 9.7 billion; in terms of cash, direct losses amount to CFAF 30.80 billion. If the losses are huge at the

In Ouagadougou, for example, fishmongers and bakeries have seen their goods rot due to lack of customers. With the curfew which is fixed at 19 h, night workers (marquis, restaurants, etc.) have recorded many losses. The traders of Rood-woko who are supplied with various products, thinking to do good business in the approach of the festival of the Tabaski, had to disillusion. Customers are without money; that is to say, the future is hard enough for Burkinabe. Depending largely on external aid, the state will still turn to the partners. In 2014, economic activity slowed down considerably, with GDP growth estimated at only 4% compared to more than 6% in previous years. The decline in economic activity was caused by the fall in international prices of the country's two export commodities (gold and cotton); by the repercussions of the Ebola crisis in the region, which has disrupted the tourism sectors and services; and by the popular uprising of October 30 and 31. The sharp drop in tax revenues, combined with an increase in the wage bill, required a sharp reduction in public investment spending. It has thus compromised the implementation of the government's accelerated Strategy for Growth and Sustainable Development (SCADD). With this new blood loss of 50 billion, the economic equilibrium is questioned. It will be necessary to

Mali is not spared. At the time of independence, the country was a net exporter of cereals. The 1970s, marked by a series of catastrophic droughts and a growing share of local needs, was filled with international food aid and imports. At the same time, the Office of Agricultural Products of Mali (OPAM) held the legal monopoly of grain marketing [25]. With the force shot on 19 November 1968, bringing Moussa Traoré to power, the first measures taken by the military government in economic matters were the dismantling of collective fields and the removal of monopoly OPAM. Indeed, this structure had accumulated huge deficits (20.4 billion CFA francs in 1981). It only bought less than 5% of local production. This situation explains the pressure of the main donors of food aid for a reform of the grain market.

*been made, but the causes have rarely been seriously sought [23].*

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85998*

macro level, they are also huge at the micro level.

quickly find alternatives for economic recovery [24].

<sup>12</sup> P.H, health worker, 40 years old, Burkinabé ; M.K, Teacher, 50 years old, Malian.

<sup>13</sup> A collaborator of Moussa Traoré, he was arrested in 1971 and also died in detention in 1973 under mysterious conditions.

<sup>14</sup> Secretary General of the UNEEM, tortured dies in prison in the same year.

<sup>15</sup> President, Founding father of the term 'Burkina Faso', dies tragically, in conditions never elucidated.

<sup>16</sup> G.K, Ivorian, Employed in a company.

*Management of Political Power and Consequences in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Solution Outline DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85998*

*In Africa, however, it is generally difficult to admit that the Constitution, even a liberal one, guarantees democratic life. The rulers seem to be above the constitutions they despise, as they do of the peoples they govern. They seem to be accountable only to old metropolises and international institutions. The diagnosis of evil has already been made, but the causes have rarely been seriously sought [23].*

The force shots negatively affected the agriculture and the economy of these countries. In Burkina Faso, as it was to be expected, the force shot perpetrated on 17 September 2015 by the National Council for Democracy (CND) had many economic repercussions due to the cessation of activities in 10 days. According to the Extraordinary Council of Ministers of 28 September 2015, the losses amount to more than 50 billion FCFA. As a result, the government must turn to the partners to fill this gap, in order to close the budget year and to face the new challenges engendered by the coup. The elections scheduled in October 2015 were no longer relevant. The government intends to step up security measures. The extension of the transition already seems in the line of fire. According to the government, the force shot led to adverse consequences. If there are losses in human lives and social injuries, the general strike of the workers has led to the paralysis of all activities at the economic level, for several days. The work stoppage caused a slowdown in production in the business sectors, particularly the secondary and tertiary sectors, with direct consequences of less than 0.3% growth on public finances. According to the figures provided by the Minister of Economy and Finance, in terms of taxes, the recovery losses incurred during the coup period were estimated at about 11 billion CFA francs. In terms of customs revenue, they are estimated at about CFAF 9.7 billion; in terms of cash, direct losses amount to CFAF 30.80 billion. If the losses are huge at the macro level, they are also huge at the micro level.

In Ouagadougou, for example, fishmongers and bakeries have seen their goods rot due to lack of customers. With the curfew which is fixed at 19 h, night workers (marquis, restaurants, etc.) have recorded many losses. The traders of Rood-woko who are supplied with various products, thinking to do good business in the approach of the festival of the Tabaski, had to disillusion. Customers are without money; that is to say, the future is hard enough for Burkinabe. Depending largely on external aid, the state will still turn to the partners. In 2014, economic activity slowed down considerably, with GDP growth estimated at only 4% compared to more than 6% in previous years. The decline in economic activity was caused by the fall in international prices of the country's two export commodities (gold and cotton); by the repercussions of the Ebola crisis in the region, which has disrupted the tourism sectors and services; and by the popular uprising of October 30 and 31. The sharp drop in tax revenues, combined with an increase in the wage bill, required a sharp reduction in public investment spending.

It has thus compromised the implementation of the government's accelerated Strategy for Growth and Sustainable Development (SCADD). With this new blood loss of 50 billion, the economic equilibrium is questioned. It will be necessary to quickly find alternatives for economic recovery [24].

Mali is not spared. At the time of independence, the country was a net exporter of cereals. The 1970s, marked by a series of catastrophic droughts and a growing share of local needs, was filled with international food aid and imports. At the same time, the Office of Agricultural Products of Mali (OPAM) held the legal monopoly of grain marketing [25]. With the force shot on 19 November 1968, bringing Moussa Traoré to power, the first measures taken by the military government in economic matters were the dismantling of collective fields and the removal of monopoly OPAM. Indeed, this structure had accumulated huge deficits (20.4 billion CFA francs in 1981). It only bought less than 5% of local production. This situation explains the pressure of the main donors of food aid for a reform of the grain market.

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

*unemployment are common to African countries without exception.<sup>12</sup>*

strators descended into the suburbs of Ouagadougou [19].

*high blood pressure). In addition, favouritism, corruption, poor governance and* 

The above data indicate the actual existence of discomfort situations. In Mali, Modibo Kéita died in detention under conditions never elucidated. Yoro Diakité13 and Abdoul Karim Camara14 suffered the same fate. In Burkina Faso, Thomas Sankara15 disappeared tragically. On 30 October 2014, tens of thousands of demon-

The consequences of the democratic deficit are shared by several West African countries. This is the case with Côte d'ivoire. Indeed, the socio-political crisis of 19 September 2002 to 11 April 2011, linked to the frantic quest for power, has made more than 3000 deaths, not to mention the destruction of public and private property. Food, water, gas, deaths due to drug shortages and diseases such as typhoid and cholera are part of the disasters caused by the democratic deficit. Patients suffering from metabolic diseases (diabetes, stroke, hypertension) have seen their health worsen. Indeed, the complexity of the crisis, because of its political ramifications, has caused a situation of discomfort. An embargo by the European Union has suffocated the country. The health system has been deprived of medicines indispensable to the care of the sick. In the face of this difficulty, saturated emergencies are overwhelmed with patients. There are many families whose parents have relatives have succumbed to their illness due to lack of medication. These respondents confirm:

*During the crisis that shook our country after the 2010 presidential election, we saw a lot of disappointing things. The Westerners have caused the death of several patients with diabetes, hypertension, cardiac accident for nothing. How can one be foolish, to the point of being insensitive to the suffering of innocent people? An embargo on drugs is never seen before. Sick people died because of poorly enlightened politicians.16*

Peace is trampled underfoot leaving free field to hatred and interethnic conflicts fuelled by politicians guided by a single concern, power. The internal refugees and those who fled the violence to meet in Ghana, Guinea, Togo and Benin are counted by the thousands. The patients, victims of trauma, swarm in the health centres. Everyone for all, all for all, God for all or acting solidarity has given way to everyone

Rwanda had also suffered the agony of the democratic deficit [20]. The United Nations [21] estimates that about 800,000 people, mostly Tutsi, lost their lives during these 3 months. Those among the Hutus who showed solidarity with the Tutsis were killed as traitors to the Hutu cause. For a hundred of days, it was the fastest genocide in history and the largest in the number of deaths per day. The story of Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu was confused with that of Nigeria. Leader of the rebellion, he was for two and a half years (30 May 1967–8 January 1970) the self-proclaimed president of the secessionist region (Biafra) at the cost of hundreds of thousands of deaths [22]. If the dead are of life is recorded throughout Africa, the manifest willingness of some leaders to change the constitution in order to perpetuate themselves in power or position and their children as heirs also justifies the democratic deficit and its

<sup>13</sup> A collaborator of Moussa Traoré, he was arrested in 1971 and also died in detention in 1973 under mys-

<sup>15</sup> President, Founding father of the term 'Burkina Faso', dies tragically, in conditions never elucidated.

<sup>12</sup> P.H, health worker, 40 years old, Burkinabé ; M.K, Teacher, 50 years old, Malian.

<sup>14</sup> Secretary General of the UNEEM, tortured dies in prison in the same year.

**142**

consequences:

terious conditions.

<sup>16</sup> G.K, Ivorian, Employed in a company.

for himself, God for all.

#### *Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

Negotiations between the Malian government and the donors culminated in 1981 with the establishment of the Program for Restructuring the Cereal Market (PRMC).

In 1980, a report by the World Bank drew up a fairly damning picture of the situation of the Malian economy. It considers that the structure of the Malian economy, with a state orientation, is characterized by a series of complex mechanisms of transfer. About 90% of the country's budgetary resources guarantee employment for only a tiny fraction of the Malian workforce in a parastatal state sector. This relatively privileged part of the population benefits almost alone from an assured supply of consumer goods. Resources do not come only from the rural world but from all productive activities that are potentially more profitable. They are unable to borrow and invest. "In the end, all the internal mechanisms of the Malian economy function in the sense of a withdrawal of resources from the poor to the nonpoor and from productive to non-productive" [26].

Comparative analysis shows that Africa, particularly Saharan countries, suffers from poor governance. As a result, one question comes back as a leitmotiv: "Is Africa ripe for democracy?" To this question concern, an anticipated response seems to be found. In the early 1990, Jacques Chirac stated: "Democracy is a luxury for Africa". Insult or reality? On the question, part of the intelligentsia felt offended, infantilized, ridiculed and humiliated. Great was the emotion, what more normal. But the observation of daily life and political events in Africa has finally convinced us that democracy is modelled on the Western model. Indeed, did the French state17 not mandate Pierre Mazeaud18 to write the constitutions of Chad, Togo and Niger? How many African countries are exempt? Despite their importance, they are difficult to swallow as pills administered to patients for the simple reason that they are inadequate. This is the justification of Kyelem's thesis [23]:

*Despite their beautiful mount, African constitutions are totally alien to the peoples of Africa. They are products of the Westernized elite, destined for its own contemplation and to reassure the international community of its fidelity in the mimicry. The Constitution in Africa is usually a legal varnish making up a personal or oligarchic power.*

The daily experience of traditional societies shows that democracy is not in exile in Africa. Many anthropologists, including [27], have indicated the major role they can play in democratic advancement. The *Odjukru* sample is an illustration of this.

### **3.** *Ɛb-eb***: a traditional institution serving democracy in Africa**

This part of the study describes *Ɛb-eb* and explains its link with good governance. It is of *Odjukru* invention. In the village of *Armɛbɛ*, here are three cycles of *Abrmâ*, between 1800 and 1831, and three rich notables of the age-class *Nigbesi* decided to offer food and drink to the people in order to obtain their blessing on their reign. The initiative of the group would have become a custom and then an institution with the accreditation and organization introduced by the assembly of the age classes [28]. This tradition, which leaves unclear the names of the authors, the process of institutionalization and the first modalities of diffusion, remains the first at least to attest to the endogeneity of a large sociocultural institution among *Odjukru*. The place of birth of the latter can be placed at the penultimate site of *Armɛbɛ*, near *Aklodj-Ɛb-Sig-Ɛm*, a rare village to be preserved, in the old form of the ritual. How is *Ɛb-eb* organized?

**145**

<sup>19</sup> Military parade. <sup>20</sup> The Griot.

*Management of Political Power and Consequences in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Solution Outline*

there will be more productive activity. The period of *war* already begins.

*Akan* model, surrounded by singing artists, *Kokoba*,

The second retreat is solemnly formalized on the consecrated day. The news is spreading in all the villages. The day before, from everywhere, the parents bring to the candidate the most splendid pieces of loincloths, adornments and ornaments of the family patrimony. Children, grandchildren and friends address food, drink, toiletries, an emulation of love, piety and generosity. A great *Jaj*19 formerly accompanied the retreat. Returning to the interior of the houses, with the fall of the night, the candidates will officially appear at the Agora only to undergo the investiture. Retirement lasts at least a week; every day, superb and varied toilets, good food and price drinks. In the various courses, songs and dance often commanded from distant villages; every night and every morning, big drum praising the village and exalting the great men. How do the candidates receive the coronation of the ruler? The day of the exit is that of the coronation itself. Four acts fulfil it: The installation of the candidates and the arrival of the outgoing rulers, the speeches, the ceremony of the coronation and the Declaration of Rights. In the afternoon under the excitement of the hero, the drum, active at dawn, begins the ceremony. In the large place, chairs, whose transport can be an obligatory service of the subordinate age class, are prepared, rich and royal, by the families. Adorned with their most splendid loincloths, lavishly covered with gold, the candidates come as kings of the

At the entrance to the central street, the district greets them and leads them to the main square, where they settle down, under the repeated salute of the drum, while their courtiers of the day reward the drummers with a rain of silver coins. Following the same procedure, the whole village accompanies the arrival of the rulers at the end of the year. The protocol that opens up any great political assembly takes place with solemnity, first the protocol that opens up any great political assembly takes place. At the sound of the drum, the autobiographical speeches, where each candidate praises his lineage are heard. According to the odjukru, it's *Nɛɲ-idj* or the art of boasting. Three rites make the liturgy of the coronation during the liturgy of the coronation. The first rite is the perception of rights. Each candidate carries out the ultimate right in drink and money, the amount of which varies from one place to another. The second rite is religious invocation. Taking to witness God (*Fonjamba*) and the Earth (*wus*), the dean of the age of outgoing rulers passes power as his class has received, entrusts the country to the cadets and demands for their longevity and wisdom "that they are masters of power and that they assume it", but not that the power is their master and assumes them (*Ɛb-kidrɛl*). He seeks for the earth tenderness and prosperity; for women, fertility and virtue; and for the village, peace and wealth. The strained drink, first to the sky, flows on the nourishing Earth. The third

20 praising friends and relatives.

It is every 8 years after the initiation of an age class that the ceremonies of the coronation take place. Opened after the initiation of the third subclass *kata* in the small rainy season, it follows from village to village, 2 years in a row, following the same traditional order. The coronation obeyed several stages, including the offering of *attieke.* The first obligation of the candidates towards the village is the offering of food and drink. The offering of the political investiture varies in terms of distribution from one locality to another. It goes to the whole village, except the outgoing rulers, the nomination contestants and the uninitiated. It is after this common meal that the calendar of ceremonies is stopped. From the initiation announcing the season of the coronation, the candidates are called to remain in the village. Distant voyages are outlawed. After the offering of *attieke*,

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85998*

<sup>17</sup> Event (french weekly journal) n°604, Thursday, may 30th, 1996.

<sup>18</sup> President of National Assembly commissionof laws.

#### *Management of Political Power and Consequences in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Solution Outline DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85998*

It is every 8 years after the initiation of an age class that the ceremonies of the coronation take place. Opened after the initiation of the third subclass *kata* in the small rainy season, it follows from village to village, 2 years in a row, following the same traditional order. The coronation obeyed several stages, including the offering of *attieke.* The first obligation of the candidates towards the village is the offering of food and drink. The offering of the political investiture varies in terms of distribution from one locality to another. It goes to the whole village, except the outgoing rulers, the nomination contestants and the uninitiated. It is after this common meal that the calendar of ceremonies is stopped. From the initiation announcing the season of the coronation, the candidates are called to remain in the village. Distant voyages are outlawed. After the offering of *attieke*, there will be more productive activity. The period of *war* already begins.

The second retreat is solemnly formalized on the consecrated day. The news is spreading in all the villages. The day before, from everywhere, the parents bring to the candidate the most splendid pieces of loincloths, adornments and ornaments of the family patrimony. Children, grandchildren and friends address food, drink, toiletries, an emulation of love, piety and generosity. A great *Jaj*19 formerly accompanied the retreat. Returning to the interior of the houses, with the fall of the night, the candidates will officially appear at the Agora only to undergo the investiture. Retirement lasts at least a week; every day, superb and varied toilets, good food and price drinks. In the various courses, songs and dance often commanded from distant villages; every night and every morning, big drum praising the village and exalting the great men. How do the candidates receive the coronation of the ruler?

The day of the exit is that of the coronation itself. Four acts fulfil it: The installation of the candidates and the arrival of the outgoing rulers, the speeches, the ceremony of the coronation and the Declaration of Rights. In the afternoon under the excitement of the hero, the drum, active at dawn, begins the ceremony. In the large place, chairs, whose transport can be an obligatory service of the subordinate age class, are prepared, rich and royal, by the families. Adorned with their most splendid loincloths, lavishly covered with gold, the candidates come as kings of the *Akan* model, surrounded by singing artists, *Kokoba*, 20 praising friends and relatives. At the entrance to the central street, the district greets them and leads them to the main square, where they settle down, under the repeated salute of the drum, while their courtiers of the day reward the drummers with a rain of silver coins. Following the same procedure, the whole village accompanies the arrival of the rulers at the end of the year. The protocol that opens up any great political assembly takes place with solemnity, first the protocol that opens up any great political assembly takes place. At the sound of the drum, the autobiographical speeches, where each candidate praises his lineage are heard. According to the odjukru, it's *Nɛɲ-idj* or the art of boasting.

Three rites make the liturgy of the coronation during the liturgy of the coronation. The first rite is the perception of rights. Each candidate carries out the ultimate right in drink and money, the amount of which varies from one place to another. The second rite is religious invocation. Taking to witness God (*Fonjamba*) and the Earth (*wus*), the dean of the age of outgoing rulers passes power as his class has received, entrusts the country to the cadets and demands for their longevity and wisdom "that they are masters of power and that they assume it", but not that the power is their master and assumes them (*Ɛb-kidrɛl*). He seeks for the earth tenderness and prosperity; for women, fertility and virtue; and for the village, peace and wealth. The strained drink, first to the sky, flows on the nourishing Earth. The third

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

inadequate. This is the justification of Kyelem's thesis [23]:

*oligarchic power.*

*Despite their beautiful mount, African constitutions are totally alien to the peoples of Africa. They are products of the Westernized elite, destined for its own contemplation and to reassure the international community of its fidelity in the mimicry. The Constitution in Africa is usually a legal varnish making up a personal or* 

The daily experience of traditional societies shows that democracy is not in exile in Africa. Many anthropologists, including [27], have indicated the major role they can play in democratic advancement. The *Odjukru* sample is an illustration of this.

This part of the study describes *Ɛb-eb* and explains its link with good governance. It is of *Odjukru* invention. In the village of *Armɛbɛ*, here are three cycles of *Abrmâ*, between 1800 and 1831, and three rich notables of the age-class *Nigbesi* decided to offer food and drink to the people in order to obtain their blessing on their reign. The initiative of the group would have become a custom and then an institution with the accreditation and organization introduced by the assembly of the age classes [28]. This tradition, which leaves unclear the names of the authors, the process of institutionalization and the first modalities of diffusion, remains the first at least to attest to the endogeneity of a large sociocultural institution among *Odjukru*. The place of birth of the latter can be placed at the penultimate site of *Armɛbɛ*, near *Aklodj-Ɛb-Sig-Ɛm*, a rare village to be preserved, in the old form of the ritual. How is *Ɛb-eb* organized?

**3.** *Ɛb-eb***: a traditional institution serving democracy in Africa**

<sup>17</sup> Event (french weekly journal) n°604, Thursday, may 30th, 1996.

<sup>18</sup> President of National Assembly commissionof laws.

Negotiations between the Malian government and the donors culminated in 1981 with the establishment of the Program for Restructuring the Cereal Market (PRMC). In 1980, a report by the World Bank drew up a fairly damning picture of the situation of the Malian economy. It considers that the structure of the Malian economy, with a state orientation, is characterized by a series of complex mechanisms of transfer. About 90% of the country's budgetary resources guarantee employment for only a tiny fraction of the Malian workforce in a parastatal state sector. This relatively privileged part of the population benefits almost alone from an assured supply of consumer goods. Resources do not come only from the rural world but from all productive activities that are potentially more profitable. They are unable to borrow and invest. "In the end, all the internal mechanisms of the Malian economy function in the sense of a withdrawal of resources from the poor to the nonpoor and from productive to non-productive" [26]. Comparative analysis shows that Africa, particularly Saharan countries, suffers from poor governance. As a result, one question comes back as a leitmotiv: "Is Africa ripe for democracy?" To this question concern, an anticipated response seems to be found. In the early 1990, Jacques Chirac stated: "Democracy is a luxury for Africa". Insult or reality? On the question, part of the intelligentsia felt offended, infantilized, ridiculed and humiliated. Great was the emotion, what more normal. But the observation of daily life and political events in Africa has finally convinced us that democracy is modelled on the Western model. Indeed, did the French state17 not mandate Pierre Mazeaud18 to write the constitutions of Chad, Togo and Niger? How many African countries are exempt? Despite their importance, they are difficult to swallow as pills administered to patients for the simple reason that they are

**144**

<sup>19</sup> Military parade.

<sup>20</sup> The Griot.

and final rite is the coronation (*fƐfritm*). In large communities, a large age class can receive a collective sacrament in the person of its oldest age. But usually the coronation is individual. The officiant takes a pinch of kaolin in the personal container of each candidate. With the right finger, he punctuates the forehead of the recipient, between the two eyebrows arches, the place of the moral conscience. Then with a second pinch of kaolin, he paints the candidate's right wrist in the direction of the forearm towards the hand.

Finally, he raises with both hands the arms of the consecrated who, docile, rises consecrated who, gets up full length, docile, before sitting down. At *Usr-B*, the insignias of power are then handed to them: a machete (Lab), symbol of work and war; a cane (kpamâ), symbol of the supreme authority; and finally a tiara of twigs (Arakp), symbol of justice and peace. This day in *Aklodj-A* the recipients offer salt, symbol of communion and union, to all the women of the village. The accession of an age class to power, in relation to the retirement of the former governing promotion and the rise of a young promotion, leads to changes in the political apparatus and the acquisition of new statutes. That is why the elders at the end of the investiture or later formally restate the Charter of Rights and Duties of the age classes. Holders of power, the Ɛbebu, assume the effective direction of political and religious functions. They invoke the gods and ancestors in the ordinary ceremonies, which must guarantee the prosperity, the fertility, the peace and the independence of the country. After each coronation, a collective hunt is carried out in their honour. The *Ɛbebu* has the right that any speech be suspended upon their arrival and taken over once they are seated. Alone, they are entitled to a chair in assembly. On the death of a *Ɛbebu* (father of the village), the inhabitants, during a great parade (*Jaj*), sack the goods (cultures and animals) that his blessing has made prosper on Earth. Finally, because they embody the village (*baηn*) and are unproductive, they spend their time keeping it. The rulers in exercise respond to the significant salvation of *Bahn Kwa* or salvation village [28].

The term *ɛb-eb* comes from the word *ɛb* (village, city) and from the verb *eb* (caring, caring for), which literally means accepting the society. It is an action of gratitude to the city which saw the birth of the individual and which gave him everything. Clearly, it is the management of power. In the modern society in the democratic mimicry, the question of power rhymes with competition. Old and young are embarking on the race to the supreme judiciary. As we have already mentioned, it is largely enamelled by serious incidents (casualties, deaths, destruction of public buildings). The parties involved in the presidential election, who became enemies rather than opponents, fought fiercely for power. The policy perceived as the art of governing has evolved in the battlefield. The structures responsible for organizing the elections are biased and accused of jamming of ballot boxes and of the rigging of results. This situation of discomfort destroys the social cohesion.

The *Lodjukru* makes another reading of the transmission of power. Two age classes are involved in the political system. The first one holds the power. The second class (cadet) is the one who receives the insignia of power. It is after 8 years of management of the city that the age class at the end of the term, holder of the authority, gives power to the class that succeeds him during the ceremony of the *Ɛb-eb*. No election is organized for this purpose. It is true that written texts relating to the transmission of power do not exist in *Odjukru* countries, like the traditional African societies. However, they are recorded in drums (Brem) and collective memories. As a result, young people to the old, each social category is educated and trained on the issue of governance. The transmission is therefore descending (elder to cadets) and is mainly done through the age classes. Unlike modern democracy, power is transmitted without arguments. The age group at the end of the term is aware that it no longer has the political authority. As a result, she is required to return power to

**147**

<sup>21</sup> It's the President of age Group. <sup>22</sup> The concept designates the Herault.

<sup>23</sup> He raises the sessions.

**4. Conclusion**

*Management of Political Power and Consequences in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Solution Outline*

the class that succeeds her, without bloodshed. The passing is in a festive, cordial, fraternal atmosphere, because the main objective to be achieved is the prosperity and stability of the city. In *Odjukru* countries, power does not fight; it is transmitted in a peaceful way. Coups and attempts at usurpation are prohibited, because the populations, all categories combined, have a democratic culture. Age classes know that they will necessarily be in power. Therefore, the struggle for power appears as a nonsense, a haste or even a social disorder. It disintegrates the society. Through this attitude, the society teaches the individual certain values, including respect for the fundamental texts (the Constitution), patience, self-giving and values trampled upon in

Like the great democracies, there is a separation of power. He′s a legal guarantor. The odjukru knows, like Montesquieu [12], that the spirit *Odjukru* knows that *the spirit of inequality leads democracy to the aristocracy or to the government of one and the spirit of extreme equality leads to the despotism of one, as the despotism of only one ends with conquest*. To avoid confusion of powers and choose representatives of the age class, various virtues including good morality, self-giving and dual vision are required by the sages, holders of gérontocratique power. Thus, the *milͻwl*21 provides the executive, and the *mbwa*22 represents the legislature, when the *Aɲâ*23 exercises the role of the judiciary. The distribution of responsibilities aims to prevent the promoted actors from becoming corrupt by implementing laws that are favourable to them. Of course, people are chosen to act on behalf of the age class. However, no decision is made without the consent of the members of the group. Clearly, power management is collegial. The cyclical administration of power can inspire modern societies facing a democratic deficit, which is justified in the first chapter of the study. Like the United States, where two parties (Republicans and Democrats) occupy and animate the political scene, the multitude recorded in Africa can be grouped into two major entities, to exercise a mandate of five renewable ones, cyclically. This provision will

The reflection on the democratic management of the cities shows how complex this reality is and remains an essential concern of today's African societies. The hypothesis of the three zones (Burkina Faso, Mali, Lodjukru) studied is therefore not fortuitous. The observation of the facts and the analysis of the data made it possible to identify different socio-political crises due to a democratic deficit. Thus, demonstrations on the deprivation of liberty, poor living and working conditions are part of the daily lives of the people. Repressions, most often bloody, are recorded in the countries raised. In addition to this, there are contested elections due to poor organizational conditions (ballot jams, result-rigging), thus causing poor governance and autocratic management. This situation of discomfort shows the inadequacy of democracy, modelled on the west, and the democratic inculture of the leaders. Good governance is not in exile in Africa. The example of *Lodjukru*, through the *Ɛb-eb*, is an illustration, because the transmission of power is peaceful. In short, if the countries of sub-Saharan Africa have a poor governance, circumvented in Odjukru countries, democracy in this region of Africa requires a profound

prevent coups of states and prevent attempts to confiscate power.

analysis to adapt it to the sociocultural context of our societies.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85998*

the modern African democracies.

*Management of Political Power and Consequences in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Solution Outline DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85998*

the class that succeeds her, without bloodshed. The passing is in a festive, cordial, fraternal atmosphere, because the main objective to be achieved is the prosperity and stability of the city. In *Odjukru* countries, power does not fight; it is transmitted in a peaceful way. Coups and attempts at usurpation are prohibited, because the populations, all categories combined, have a democratic culture. Age classes know that they will necessarily be in power. Therefore, the struggle for power appears as a nonsense, a haste or even a social disorder. It disintegrates the society. Through this attitude, the society teaches the individual certain values, including respect for the fundamental texts (the Constitution), patience, self-giving and values trampled upon in the modern African democracies.

Like the great democracies, there is a separation of power. He′s a legal guarantor. The odjukru knows, like Montesquieu [12], that the spirit *Odjukru* knows that *the spirit of inequality leads democracy to the aristocracy or to the government of one and the spirit of extreme equality leads to the despotism of one, as the despotism of only one ends with conquest*. To avoid confusion of powers and choose representatives of the age class, various virtues including good morality, self-giving and dual vision are required by the sages, holders of gérontocratique power. Thus, the *milͻwl*21 provides the executive, and the *mbwa*22 represents the legislature, when the *Aɲâ*23 exercises the role of the judiciary. The distribution of responsibilities aims to prevent the promoted actors from becoming corrupt by implementing laws that are favourable to them. Of course, people are chosen to act on behalf of the age class. However, no decision is made without the consent of the members of the group. Clearly, power management is collegial. The cyclical administration of power can inspire modern societies facing a democratic deficit, which is justified in the first chapter of the study. Like the United States, where two parties (Republicans and Democrats) occupy and animate the political scene, the multitude recorded in Africa can be grouped into two major entities, to exercise a mandate of five renewable ones, cyclically. This provision will prevent coups of states and prevent attempts to confiscate power.

#### **4. Conclusion**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

forearm towards the hand.

salvation village [28].

and final rite is the coronation (*fƐfritm*). In large communities, a large age class can receive a collective sacrament in the person of its oldest age. But usually the coronation is individual. The officiant takes a pinch of kaolin in the personal container of each candidate. With the right finger, he punctuates the forehead of the recipient, between the two eyebrows arches, the place of the moral conscience. Then with a second pinch of kaolin, he paints the candidate's right wrist in the direction of the

Finally, he raises with both hands the arms of the consecrated who, docile, rises

consecrated who, gets up full length, docile, before sitting down. At *Usr-B*, the insignias of power are then handed to them: a machete (Lab), symbol of work and war; a cane (kpamâ), symbol of the supreme authority; and finally a tiara of twigs (Arakp), symbol of justice and peace. This day in *Aklodj-A* the recipients offer salt, symbol of communion and union, to all the women of the village. The accession of an age class to power, in relation to the retirement of the former governing promotion and the rise of a young promotion, leads to changes in the political apparatus and the acquisition of new statutes. That is why the elders at the end of the investiture or later formally restate the Charter of Rights and Duties of the age classes. Holders of power, the Ɛbebu, assume the effective direction of political and religious functions. They invoke the gods and ancestors in the ordinary ceremonies, which must guarantee the prosperity, the fertility, the peace and the independence of the country. After each coronation, a collective hunt is carried out in their honour. The *Ɛbebu* has the right that any speech be suspended upon their arrival and taken over once they are seated. Alone, they are entitled to a chair in assembly. On the death of a *Ɛbebu* (father of the village), the inhabitants, during a great parade (*Jaj*), sack the goods (cultures and animals) that his blessing has made prosper on Earth. Finally, because they embody the village (*baηn*) and are unproductive, they spend their time keeping it. The rulers in exercise respond to the significant salvation of *Bahn Kwa* or

The term *ɛb-eb* comes from the word *ɛb* (village, city) and from the verb *eb* (caring, caring for), which literally means accepting the society. It is an action of gratitude to the city which saw the birth of the individual and which gave him everything. Clearly, it is the management of power. In the modern society in the democratic mimicry, the question of power rhymes with competition. Old and young are embarking on the race to the supreme judiciary. As we have already mentioned, it is largely enamelled by serious incidents (casualties, deaths, destruction of public buildings). The parties involved in the presidential election, who became enemies rather than opponents, fought fiercely for power. The policy perceived as the art of governing has evolved in the battlefield. The structures responsible for organizing the elections are biased and accused of jamming of ballot boxes and of the rigging of results. This situation of discomfort destroys the social cohesion. The *Lodjukru* makes another reading of the transmission of power. Two age classes are involved in the political system. The first one holds the power. The second class (cadet) is the one who receives the insignia of power. It is after 8 years of management of the city that the age class at the end of the term, holder of the authority, gives power to the class that succeeds him during the ceremony of the *Ɛb-eb*. No election is organized for this purpose. It is true that written texts relating to the transmission of power do not exist in *Odjukru* countries, like the traditional African societies. However, they are recorded in drums (Brem) and collective memories. As a result, young people to the old, each social category is educated and trained on the issue of governance. The transmission is therefore descending (elder to cadets) and is mainly done through the age classes. Unlike modern democracy, power is transmitted without arguments. The age group at the end of the term is aware that it no longer has the political authority. As a result, she is required to return power to

**146**

The reflection on the democratic management of the cities shows how complex this reality is and remains an essential concern of today's African societies. The hypothesis of the three zones (Burkina Faso, Mali, Lodjukru) studied is therefore not fortuitous. The observation of the facts and the analysis of the data made it possible to identify different socio-political crises due to a democratic deficit. Thus, demonstrations on the deprivation of liberty, poor living and working conditions are part of the daily lives of the people. Repressions, most often bloody, are recorded in the countries raised. In addition to this, there are contested elections due to poor organizational conditions (ballot jams, result-rigging), thus causing poor governance and autocratic management. This situation of discomfort shows the inadequacy of democracy, modelled on the west, and the democratic inculture of the leaders. Good governance is not in exile in Africa. The example of *Lodjukru*, through the *Ɛb-eb*, is an illustration, because the transmission of power is peaceful. In short, if the countries of sub-Saharan Africa have a poor governance, circumvented in Odjukru countries, democracy in this region of Africa requires a profound analysis to adapt it to the sociocultural context of our societies.

<sup>21</sup> It's the President of age Group.

<sup>22</sup> The concept designates the Herault.

<sup>23</sup> He raises the sessions.

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

#### **Author details**

Akmel Meless Siméon Department of Anthropology and Sociology, University of Ouattara, Bouake, Côte d'Ivoire

\*Address all correspondence to: melessovsky@yahoo.fr

© 2020 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

**149**

Afrique. 2016

[4] Houpert P. Ce jour-là: Le 19

le Président Modibo Kéita. Jeune

[5] Roger B. Mali: Retour sur le règne de Moussa Traoré en dix dates.

novembre 1968, un coup d'Etat renverse

*Management of Political Power and Consequences in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Solution Outline*

2016. Available from: https://www. jeuneafrique.com/312846/politique/maliretour-regime-de-moussa-traore-dixdates/ [Consulté le 15 septembre 2018]

[6] Boisbouvier C. Coup d'Etat au Mali: Le jour où ATT a été renversé. Jeune

[7] Laniepce L. Au Burkina Faso, le coup d'Etat le plus bête. 2016. Lidivine https://www.google.com/search?so urce=hp&ei=CEzjW6OGGPKLmg W0tKyAAg&q=laniepce%2C+coup +d%27%C3%A9tat+au+burkina+f aso&oq=laniepce%2C+coup+d%27 %C3%A9tat+au+burkina+faso&gs\_ l=psy-ab.3...2561.47602.0.48317. 37.37.0.0.0.0.1281.8522.2-20j0j1j0j1j2. 24.0....0...1c.1.64.psy-ab..13.21.7295...0 j0i131k1j0i10k1j0i30k1j0i5i30k1j0i22i30 k1j33i160k1j33i21k1.0.4vsKCvGYWGA [Consulté le 15 septembre 2018]

[8] Jean-Jacques R. Discours sur l'origine et les fondements de l'inégalité parmi les

[9] O.N.U. La déclaration universelle des droits de l'homme. 1948. https://www. google.com/search?source=hp&ei=CE zjW6OGGPKLmgW0tKyAAg&q=Po urtant+au+niveau+international%2C +elle+est+associ%C3%A9e+%C3%A0 +la+libert%C3%A9+d%27expression +et+fait+l%E2%80%99objet+de+l%E 2%80%99article+19+de+la+d%C3%A 9claration+universelle+des+droits+d e+l%E2%80%99homme+%28Onu%2 C+1948%29%3A++&oq=Pourtant+au +niveau+international%2C+elle+est+a ssoci%C3%A9e+%C3%A0+la+libert% C3%A9+d%27expression+et+fait+l%E 2%80%99objet+de+l%E2%80%99arti cle+19+de+la+d%C3%A9claration+uni verselle+des+droits+de+l%E2%80%99 homme+%28Onu%2C+1948%29%3A+ +&gs\_l=psy-ab.3...5018.5018.0.12295.1 .1.0.0.0.0.0.0..0.0....0...1c.2.64.psyab..1.0.0....0.Z6Egq6mPUQM [Consulté

hommes. Paris: Gallimard; 2014

le 15 septembre 2018]

Afrique. 2012

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85998*

[1] Igue J. Une nouvelle génération de leaders en Afrique, quels enjeux. Revue Internationale de Politique de Développement. 2010;**1**:117-138

[2] Lopes H. Tribaliques. Yaoundé:

[3] Afrique J. Le règne de Moussa Traoré au Mali. 2011. Available from: https://www.google.com/search?sourc e=hp&ei=CEzjW6OGGPKLmgW0tKy AAg&q=Les+promesses+de+d%C3% A9part+se+sont+transform%C3%A9 es+en+illusions%2C+parce+qu%E2% 80%99elles+n%E2%80%99ont+jamai s+%C3%A9t%C3%A9+respect%C3% A9es.+Profitant+de+la+d%C3%A9gra dation+de+la+situation+sociopolitiqu e+et+des+difficult%C3%A9s+%C3% A9conomiques%2C+un+coup+d%E2 %80%99Etat+men%C3%A9+par+de+ jeunes+officiers+de+l%E2%80%99ar m%C3%A9e+malienne+renverse+Mo dibo+K%C3%A9ita+le+19+novembre +1968+%28Jeune+Afrique%2C+1968 %29.+&oq=Les+promesses+de+d%C 3%A9part+se+sont+transform%C3% A9es+en+illusions%2C+parce+qu%E 2%80%99elles+n%E2%80%99ont+ja mais+%C3%A9t%C3%A9+respect%C 3%A9es.+Profitant+de+la+d%C3%A9 gradation+de+la+situation+sociopolit ique+et+des+difficult%C3%A9s+%C 3%A9conomiques%2C+un+coup+d% E2%80%99Etat+men%C3%A9+par+ de+jeunes+officiers+de+l%E2%80%9 9arm%C3%A9e+malienne+renverse+ Modibo+K%C3%A9ita+le+19+novem bre+1968+%28Jeune+Afrique%2C+19 68%29.+&gs\_l=psy-ab.3...3861.3861.0 .5279.1.1.0.0.0.0.0.0..0.0....0...1c..64. psy-ab..1.0.0....0.1oSNcwPe3uc

**References**

Clé; 1971

*Management of Political Power and Consequences in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Solution Outline DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85998*

#### **References**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

© 2020 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,

Department of Anthropology and Sociology, University of Ouattara, Bouake,

**148**

**Author details**

Côte d'Ivoire

Akmel Meless Siméon

provided the original work is properly cited.

\*Address all correspondence to: melessovsky@yahoo.fr

[1] Igue J. Une nouvelle génération de leaders en Afrique, quels enjeux. Revue Internationale de Politique de Développement. 2010;**1**:117-138

[2] Lopes H. Tribaliques. Yaoundé: Clé; 1971

[3] Afrique J. Le règne de Moussa Traoré au Mali. 2011. Available from: https://www.google.com/search?sourc e=hp&ei=CEzjW6OGGPKLmgW0tKy AAg&q=Les+promesses+de+d%C3% A9part+se+sont+transform%C3%A9 es+en+illusions%2C+parce+qu%E2% 80%99elles+n%E2%80%99ont+jamai s+%C3%A9t%C3%A9+respect%C3% A9es.+Profitant+de+la+d%C3%A9gra dation+de+la+situation+sociopolitiqu e+et+des+difficult%C3%A9s+%C3% A9conomiques%2C+un+coup+d%E2 %80%99Etat+men%C3%A9+par+de+ jeunes+officiers+de+l%E2%80%99ar m%C3%A9e+malienne+renverse+Mo dibo+K%C3%A9ita+le+19+novembre +1968+%28Jeune+Afrique%2C+1968 %29.+&oq=Les+promesses+de+d%C 3%A9part+se+sont+transform%C3% A9es+en+illusions%2C+parce+qu%E 2%80%99elles+n%E2%80%99ont+ja mais+%C3%A9t%C3%A9+respect%C 3%A9es.+Profitant+de+la+d%C3%A9 gradation+de+la+situation+sociopolit ique+et+des+difficult%C3%A9s+%C 3%A9conomiques%2C+un+coup+d% E2%80%99Etat+men%C3%A9+par+ de+jeunes+officiers+de+l%E2%80%9 9arm%C3%A9e+malienne+renverse+ Modibo+K%C3%A9ita+le+19+novem bre+1968+%28Jeune+Afrique%2C+19 68%29.+&gs\_l=psy-ab.3...3861.3861.0 .5279.1.1.0.0.0.0.0.0..0.0....0...1c..64. psy-ab..1.0.0....0.1oSNcwPe3uc

[4] Houpert P. Ce jour-là: Le 19 novembre 1968, un coup d'Etat renverse le Président Modibo Kéita. Jeune Afrique. 2016

[5] Roger B. Mali: Retour sur le règne de Moussa Traoré en dix dates.

2016. Available from: https://www. jeuneafrique.com/312846/politique/maliretour-regime-de-moussa-traore-dixdates/ [Consulté le 15 septembre 2018]

[6] Boisbouvier C. Coup d'Etat au Mali: Le jour où ATT a été renversé. Jeune Afrique. 2012

[7] Laniepce L. Au Burkina Faso, le coup d'Etat le plus bête. 2016. Lidivine https://www.google.com/search?so urce=hp&ei=CEzjW6OGGPKLmg W0tKyAAg&q=laniepce%2C+coup +d%27%C3%A9tat+au+burkina+f aso&oq=laniepce%2C+coup+d%27 %C3%A9tat+au+burkina+faso&gs\_ l=psy-ab.3...2561.47602.0.48317. 37.37.0.0.0.0.1281.8522.2-20j0j1j0j1j2. 24.0....0...1c.1.64.psy-ab..13.21.7295...0 j0i131k1j0i10k1j0i30k1j0i5i30k1j0i22i30 k1j33i160k1j33i21k1.0.4vsKCvGYWGA [Consulté le 15 septembre 2018]

[8] Jean-Jacques R. Discours sur l'origine et les fondements de l'inégalité parmi les hommes. Paris: Gallimard; 2014

[9] O.N.U. La déclaration universelle des droits de l'homme. 1948. https://www. google.com/search?source=hp&ei=CE zjW6OGGPKLmgW0tKyAAg&q=Po urtant+au+niveau+international%2C +elle+est+associ%C3%A9e+%C3%A0 +la+libert%C3%A9+d%27expression +et+fait+l%E2%80%99objet+de+l%E 2%80%99article+19+de+la+d%C3%A 9claration+universelle+des+droits+d e+l%E2%80%99homme+%28Onu%2 C+1948%29%3A++&oq=Pourtant+au +niveau+international%2C+elle+est+a ssoci%C3%A9e+%C3%A0+la+libert% C3%A9+d%27expression+et+fait+l%E 2%80%99objet+de+l%E2%80%99arti cle+19+de+la+d%C3%A9claration+uni verselle+des+droits+de+l%E2%80%99 homme+%28Onu%2C+1948%29%3A+ +&gs\_l=psy-ab.3...5018.5018.0.12295.1 .1.0.0.0.0.0.0..0.0....0...1c.2.64.psyab..1.0.0....0.Z6Egq6mPUQM [Consulté le 15 septembre 2018]

[10] Ardant P. Institutions politiques et droit constitutionnel. Paris: LGDJ; 2007

[11] Ibrahim S. Elections communales sans les CNI: Les tripatouillages des résultats en vue. Mali7. 2016

[12] De Montesquieu C. De l'Esprit des lois. Genève: Barrillot; 1748

[13] Kassabo DL. Le contentieux de l'élection présidentielle en Afrique. Burkina Faso: Université Ouaga II; 2014

[14] Darracq V, Magnani V. Les élections en Afrique: Un mirage démocratique? Politique étrangère. 2011;**4**:839-850

[15] Aujourd'hui. Annulation des législatives à Divo et Kouibly: Le conseil constitutionnel et la CEI se rejettent la faute. Aujourd'hui. n°1250 du 03 janvier; 2017

[16] Imati.net. Une ex-vice-présidente de la CEI dénonce. 2017. Available from: http://www.imatin.net/imatin. net/article/politique/une-ex-vicepresidente-de-la-cei-denonce- %E2%80%9Cla-commission-en-chargedes-elections-est-complice-de-fraudes %E2%80%9C\_49500\_1483388490.html [Consulté le 10 septembre 2018]

[17] L'Inter. 24 h après les décisions du conseil constitutionnel, un vice-président de la CEI: C'est un scandalee électoral». L'Inter, n°5561 du 03 janvier; 2017

[18] Babo A. Faut-il continuer d'organiser des élections présidentielles en Afrique» ? Le Monde Afrique. 9 septembre; 2016

[19] Patinkin. Des dizaines de milliers de manifestants descendent dans les faubourgs de Ouagadougou. 2014. Available from: https://www.google. com/search?q=La+journée+du+30+octo bre+2014 [Consulté le 15 septembre 2018]

[20] Braeckman C. Rwanda, histoire d'un génocide. Paris: Fayard; 1994

[21] ONU. Quelques 800000 personnes ont été massacrées. Rapport sur le génocide au Rwanda. ONU; 2014

[22] Konan AS. Nigeria: l'homme par qui la guerre du Biafra est arrivée». Jeune Afrique. 2011

[23] Kyelem A. Mimétisme constitutionnel et déficit démocratique en Afrique. 2006. Available from: https://fr.allafrica.com/ stories/200602020743.html [Consulté le 15 septembre 2018]

[24] Bationo FA. Coup d'Etat au Burkina Faso: 50 milliards de pertes sèches pour l'économie nationale. 2015. Available from: http://www.ecodafrik. com/coup-detat-au-burkina-faso-50-milliards-de-pertes-seches-pourleconomie-nationale/ [Consulté le 23 octobre 2018]

[25] Phelinas P. Libération du commerce des grains et sécurité alimentaire au Mali: Les limites du marché, le nouveau rôle de l'Etat. Cahiers des Sciences Humaines. 1991;**27**(1-2):65-72

[26] Chronique M. Le régime de Moussa Traoré (1968-1991). 1980. Available from: https://www.clio.fr/ CHRONOLOGIE/chronologie\_mali\_le\_ regime\_de\_moussa\_traore1968-1991.asp [Consulté le 23 octobre 2018]

[27] Gluckman M. Politics, Law and Ritual in Tribal Societies. Londres: Aldine Publishing Company; 2006

[28] Memel FH. Le système politique de Lodjukru: Une société lignagère à classes d'âge. Paris: Présence Africaine; 1980

**151**

of fake news [4, 5].

**Chapter 9**

**Abstract**

**1. Introduction**

basis via platforms such as Facebook.

with regard to their sources or contents.

of users compared to other social media platforms.

and Empathy

Analysis of Information Spreading

by Social Media Based on Emotion

The number of social media users has increased exponentially in recent times, and various types of social media platforms are being introduced. While social media has become a convenient communication tool, its use has caused various social problems. Some users who cannot imagine the emotions their posts may induce in readers cause what is termed as "the flaming phenomenon." In some cases, users intentionally repeat strong remarks for self-advertisement. To identify the cause of this phenomenon, it is necessary to analyze the posted contents or the personalities of the users who cause the flaming. However, it is difficult to reach a generalized conclusion because each case varies depending on the circumstances and individual. In this chapter, we study the phenomenon of information spreading via communication on social media by conducting a detailed analysis of replies and number of retweets in Japanese, and we reveal the relation between the feedback on

*Kazuyuki Matsumoto, Minoru Yoshida and Kenji Kita*

such posts and the emotions or empathy they result in.

**Keywords:** social media, information diffusion, flaming, buzz, Twitter

Recently, opportunities for online communications through social media have increased. One such notable example is that of Twitter, which has a large number of users who use it to advertise products or events or simply to communicate with other users about their hobbies on a real name or handle name basis. More informal communications and business activities are preferably conducted on a real name

Many Japanese tend use social media freely and easily without identifying themselves. This is thought to be one of the reasons why Twitter has the highest number

Some users think that they can express their opinions freely on social media platforms. Therefore, it is possible that comments about a product or service posted on the social media may not be as honest as those on consumer review sites. Thus, the high anonymity of social media results in many posts that may be less reliable

Therefore, it is important to extract and analyze effective information from social media posts in terms of topics such as true/false judgments [1, 2], judgments regarding the negativity/positivity of infectious disease detection [3], and judgments

#### **Chapter 9**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

[21] ONU. Quelques 800000 personnes ont été massacrées. Rapport sur le génocide au Rwanda. ONU; 2014

[22] Konan AS. Nigeria: l'homme par qui la guerre du Biafra est arrivée». Jeune

constitutionnel et déficit démocratique

stories/200602020743.html [Consulté le

[24] Bationo FA. Coup d'Etat au Burkina Faso: 50 milliards de pertes sèches pour l'économie nationale. 2015. Available from: http://www.ecodafrik. com/coup-detat-au-burkina-faso-50-milliards-de-pertes-seches-pourleconomie-nationale/ [Consulté le

[25] Phelinas P. Libération du commerce des grains et sécurité alimentaire au Mali: Les limites du marché, le nouveau rôle de l'Etat. Cahiers des Sciences Humaines. 1991;**27**(1-2):65-72

[26] Chronique M. Le régime de Moussa Traoré (1968-1991). 1980. Available from: https://www.clio.fr/ CHRONOLOGIE/chronologie\_mali\_le\_ regime\_de\_moussa\_traore1968-1991.asp

[Consulté le 23 octobre 2018]

[27] Gluckman M. Politics, Law and Ritual in Tribal Societies. Londres: Aldine Publishing Company; 2006

[28] Memel FH. Le système politique de Lodjukru: Une société lignagère à classes d'âge. Paris: Présence Africaine; 1980

Afrique. 2011

[23] Kyelem A. Mimétisme

en Afrique. 2006. Available from: https://fr.allafrica.com/

15 septembre 2018]

23 octobre 2018]

[10] Ardant P. Institutions politiques et droit constitutionnel. Paris: LGDJ; 2007

[11] Ibrahim S. Elections communales sans les CNI: Les tripatouillages des

[12] De Montesquieu C. De l'Esprit des

[13] Kassabo DL. Le contentieux de l'élection présidentielle en Afrique. Burkina Faso: Université Ouaga II; 2014

[15] Aujourd'hui. Annulation des législatives à Divo et Kouibly: Le conseil constitutionnel et la CEI se rejettent la faute. Aujourd'hui. n°1250 du 03

[16] Imati.net. Une ex-vice-présidente de la CEI dénonce. 2017. Available from: http://www.imatin.net/imatin. net/article/politique/une-ex-vicepresidente-de-la-cei-denonce-

%E2%80%9Cla-commission-en-chargedes-elections-est-complice-de-fraudes %E2%80%9C\_49500\_1483388490.html

[Consulté le 10 septembre 2018]

[18] Babo A. Faut-il continuer

septembre; 2016

[17] L'Inter. 24 h après les décisions du conseil constitutionnel, un vice-président de la CEI: C'est un scandalee électoral». L'Inter, n°5561 du 03 janvier; 2017

d'organiser des élections présidentielles en Afrique» ? Le Monde Afrique. 9

[19] Patinkin. Des dizaines de milliers de manifestants descendent dans les faubourgs de Ouagadougou. 2014. Available from: https://www.google. com/search?q=La+journée+du+30+octo bre+2014 [Consulté le 15 septembre 2018]

[20] Braeckman C. Rwanda, histoire d'un

génocide. Paris: Fayard; 1994

janvier; 2017

[14] Darracq V, Magnani V. Les élections en Afrique: Un mirage démocratique? Politique étrangère. 2011;**4**:839-850

résultats en vue. Mali7. 2016

lois. Genève: Barrillot; 1748

**150**

## Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy

*Kazuyuki Matsumoto, Minoru Yoshida and Kenji Kita*

#### **Abstract**

The number of social media users has increased exponentially in recent times, and various types of social media platforms are being introduced. While social media has become a convenient communication tool, its use has caused various social problems. Some users who cannot imagine the emotions their posts may induce in readers cause what is termed as "the flaming phenomenon." In some cases, users intentionally repeat strong remarks for self-advertisement. To identify the cause of this phenomenon, it is necessary to analyze the posted contents or the personalities of the users who cause the flaming. However, it is difficult to reach a generalized conclusion because each case varies depending on the circumstances and individual. In this chapter, we study the phenomenon of information spreading via communication on social media by conducting a detailed analysis of replies and number of retweets in Japanese, and we reveal the relation between the feedback on such posts and the emotions or empathy they result in.

**Keywords:** social media, information diffusion, flaming, buzz, Twitter

#### **1. Introduction**

Recently, opportunities for online communications through social media have increased. One such notable example is that of Twitter, which has a large number of users who use it to advertise products or events or simply to communicate with other users about their hobbies on a real name or handle name basis. More informal communications and business activities are preferably conducted on a real name basis via platforms such as Facebook.

Many Japanese tend use social media freely and easily without identifying themselves. This is thought to be one of the reasons why Twitter has the highest number of users compared to other social media platforms.

Some users think that they can express their opinions freely on social media platforms. Therefore, it is possible that comments about a product or service posted on the social media may not be as honest as those on consumer review sites. Thus, the high anonymity of social media results in many posts that may be less reliable with regard to their sources or contents.

Therefore, it is important to extract and analyze effective information from social media posts in terms of topics such as true/false judgments [1, 2], judgments regarding the negativity/positivity of infectious disease detection [3], and judgments of fake news [4, 5].

In this chapter, we clarify how posts can garner the attention of other users by analyzing the reply texts as they constitute feedback on the posts. Existing studies have focused on the "flaming phenomenon" on social media, proposed a method to extract the "buzz phenomenon," detected influential users for spreading information, etc. We discuss the features these studies focused on and how effective they are at detecting posts that attract other users' attention. Moreover, we analyze the sentiments (positive/negative) based on the contents of the posts and their reply texts using our proposed sensitive analysis algorithm based on natural language text. Finally, we analyze the relation between the sentiment polarity (positive/ negative) of the replies and the attention level (the diffusion and popularity) using statistical processing and natural language processing approaches.

#### **2. Related works**

#### **2.1 Social media flaming**

On Twitter, the content of a post is largely and rapidly diffused using the retweet function. This manner of information diffusion on social media sometimes causes unexpected situations. When a post is critical about a specific person and other users diffuse that post with evil intent, it becomes a trigger for the flaming phenomenon. Several studies have detected and studied the flaming phenomenon [6–8].

Social media flaming is often caused by the social media users' aggressive comments or inappropriate statements. Such comments or statements can be a trigger of cyberbullying on social media.

Rösner et al. [9] published on the spread of information by word-of-mouth communication on the social web. Their study found that users' aggressive expressions tend to be used more often in anonymous environment than non-anonymous condition.

Sri Nandhini and Sheeba [10] proposed a method to detect cyberbullying on social networks. Their method can detect flaming, harassment, racism, and terrorism by using fuzzy logic and genetic algorithm.

#### **2.2 Retweet prediction/buzz detection**

Some studies have predicted the degree of information diffusion [11–13]. Recently, studies in the field of information extraction have shown the usefulness of extracting important information efficiently from large-scale web texts. If we can predict to what extent or to what scale a tweet of a certain piece of news or an event on social media would be influential, others too would be able to diffuse information on a large scale intentionally. For example, companies might be able to promote their products by posting tweets, given the great potential for diffusion.

It is widely known that the effective use of a social networking service (SNS) could minimize the cost of advertising and successfully promote a product or service. Thus, an increasing number of companies are implementing a strategy called buzz marketing to increase future sales.

Many studies have predicted users who can cause the buzz phenomenon or the period during which a buzz phenomenon tends to occur. Murakami and Suzuki [14] used information on the number of retweets to predict information diffusion. On Twitter, most information diffusions are caused by retweeting. Murakami and Suzuki modeled users' interests by analyzing the word distribution in the retweets of each user. Saito et al. [15] analyzed the transition of information diffusion behaviors using the asynchronous independent cascade model.

**153**

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy*

diffused the original tweet to clarify the cause for its diffusion.

These methods analyzed information diffusion. However, they could not answer a fundamental question; why were these tweets diffused in the first place? If the rules governing the buzz phenomenon are clarified, many companies would benefit via increased sales. Thus, it is important to examine the feedback from users who

Buzz marketing aims to increase the overall demand for marketed products or services, while viral marketing disseminates information about the product or

The information diffusers mostly consist of the followers of the user, who retweet the user's tweet or bookmark it as a favorite. Therefore, when a user has more influential followers, his/her tweets have a higher probability of being diffused. We sometimes call such an influential user an influencer. Some services have analyzed influencers or the degree of their influence based on the number of their

Liao et al. [19] proposed an influence measurement method called WeiboRank for other social media. Matsuo and Yasuda [20] analyzed the relations the users leading each community construct on Mixi, a Japanese SNS. Tsugawa and Kimura [21] proposed a method to identify influencers from sampled social networks on Facebook. Attracting consumers' attention to products or services in a market through an influencer on a SNS, such as a mediator, is called influencer marketing. There are two types of influencers: a mega-influencer who has over 100,000 followers and a micro-influencer who has 2000–100,000 followers. Reports show that signing on such influencers to promote company products or services can make a significant difference in sales.

Crucial differences exist between the mass media and social media. First, most of the information senders on the social media are individuals. Second, the social

As mass media creates and broadcasts programs sponsored by enterprises/companies, it strongly reflects the sponsors' intentions. However, social media provides individual users with a place to share their honest reviews or comments and enjoys an advantage in that it can create opportunities for disseminating information about products or services in terms of the value placed on them by others (i.e., users and

Recently, word-of-mouth information spreading on the social media has attracted increasing attention because it can introduce popular events or products. On the flip side, intentional diffusion of wrong information such as fake news can easily happen on the social media. First, malicious users may target an event, spreading misinformation about it, which would dupe most users except those conversant with it, or they may anonymously post fake news, pretending that the report is authentic. Else, malicious users diffuse such information using false names. Second, malicious users may target gullible users. At any rate, such activities create a negative image in the minds of some users, encouraging biased thoughts. In the case of the mass media, broadcasting of false information causes the party to lose its credibility in the viewers' minds, and viewer ratings will decrease. In such cases, the self-purification function can alleviate matters to some extent. In the case of the social media, such problems cannot be solved easily by self-purification, because the company operating the social networking site does not check the

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

service via word-of-mouth information.

followers or the frequency of their tweets [16–18].

**3. Difference between mass media and social media**

not the companies selling these products or services).

media provides an avenue for interactive exchange of information.

**2.3 Influencer**

#### *Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

These methods analyzed information diffusion. However, they could not answer a fundamental question; why were these tweets diffused in the first place? If the rules governing the buzz phenomenon are clarified, many companies would benefit via increased sales. Thus, it is important to examine the feedback from users who diffused the original tweet to clarify the cause for its diffusion.

Buzz marketing aims to increase the overall demand for marketed products or services, while viral marketing disseminates information about the product or service via word-of-mouth information.

#### **2.3 Influencer**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

statistical processing and natural language processing approaches.

**2. Related works**

**2.1 Social media flaming**

cyberbullying on social media.

ism by using fuzzy logic and genetic algorithm.

**2.2 Retweet prediction/buzz detection**

buzz marketing to increase future sales.

condition.

In this chapter, we clarify how posts can garner the attention of other users by analyzing the reply texts as they constitute feedback on the posts. Existing studies have focused on the "flaming phenomenon" on social media, proposed a method to extract the "buzz phenomenon," detected influential users for spreading information, etc. We discuss the features these studies focused on and how effective they are at detecting posts that attract other users' attention. Moreover, we analyze the sentiments (positive/negative) based on the contents of the posts and their reply texts using our proposed sensitive analysis algorithm based on natural language text. Finally, we analyze the relation between the sentiment polarity (positive/ negative) of the replies and the attention level (the diffusion and popularity) using

On Twitter, the content of a post is largely and rapidly diffused using the retweet function. This manner of information diffusion on social media sometimes causes unexpected situations. When a post is critical about a specific person and other users diffuse that post with evil intent, it becomes a trigger for the flaming phenomenon. Several studies have detected and studied the flaming phenomenon [6–8]. Social media flaming is often caused by the social media users' aggressive comments or inappropriate statements. Such comments or statements can be a trigger of

Rösner et al. [9] published on the spread of information by word-of-mouth communication on the social web. Their study found that users' aggressive expressions tend to be used more often in anonymous environment than non-anonymous

Sri Nandhini and Sheeba [10] proposed a method to detect cyberbullying on social networks. Their method can detect flaming, harassment, racism, and terror-

Some studies have predicted the degree of information diffusion [11–13]. Recently, studies in the field of information extraction have shown the usefulness of extracting important information efficiently from large-scale web texts. If we can predict to what extent or to what scale a tweet of a certain piece of news or an event on social media would be influential, others too would be able to diffuse information on a large scale intentionally. For example, companies might be able to promote

It is widely known that the effective use of a social networking service (SNS) could minimize the cost of advertising and successfully promote a product or service. Thus, an increasing number of companies are implementing a strategy called

Many studies have predicted users who can cause the buzz phenomenon or the period during which a buzz phenomenon tends to occur. Murakami and Suzuki [14] used information on the number of retweets to predict information diffusion. On Twitter, most information diffusions are caused by retweeting. Murakami and Suzuki modeled users' interests by analyzing the word distribution in the retweets of each user. Saito et al. [15] analyzed the transition of information diffusion

their products by posting tweets, given the great potential for diffusion.

behaviors using the asynchronous independent cascade model.

**152**

The information diffusers mostly consist of the followers of the user, who retweet the user's tweet or bookmark it as a favorite. Therefore, when a user has more influential followers, his/her tweets have a higher probability of being diffused. We sometimes call such an influential user an influencer. Some services have analyzed influencers or the degree of their influence based on the number of their followers or the frequency of their tweets [16–18].

Liao et al. [19] proposed an influence measurement method called WeiboRank for other social media. Matsuo and Yasuda [20] analyzed the relations the users leading each community construct on Mixi, a Japanese SNS. Tsugawa and Kimura [21] proposed a method to identify influencers from sampled social networks on Facebook.

Attracting consumers' attention to products or services in a market through an influencer on a SNS, such as a mediator, is called influencer marketing. There are two types of influencers: a mega-influencer who has over 100,000 followers and a micro-influencer who has 2000–100,000 followers. Reports show that signing on such influencers to promote company products or services can make a significant difference in sales.

#### **3. Difference between mass media and social media**

Crucial differences exist between the mass media and social media. First, most of the information senders on the social media are individuals. Second, the social media provides an avenue for interactive exchange of information.

As mass media creates and broadcasts programs sponsored by enterprises/companies, it strongly reflects the sponsors' intentions. However, social media provides individual users with a place to share their honest reviews or comments and enjoys an advantage in that it can create opportunities for disseminating information about products or services in terms of the value placed on them by others (i.e., users and not the companies selling these products or services).

Recently, word-of-mouth information spreading on the social media has attracted increasing attention because it can introduce popular events or products. On the flip side, intentional diffusion of wrong information such as fake news can easily happen on the social media. First, malicious users may target an event, spreading misinformation about it, which would dupe most users except those conversant with it, or they may anonymously post fake news, pretending that the report is authentic. Else, malicious users diffuse such information using false names. Second, malicious users may target gullible users. At any rate, such activities create a negative image in the minds of some users, encouraging biased thoughts.

In the case of the mass media, broadcasting of false information causes the party to lose its credibility in the viewers' minds, and viewer ratings will decrease. In such cases, the self-purification function can alleviate matters to some extent. In the case of the social media, such problems cannot be solved easily by self-purification, because the company operating the social networking site does not check the

contents of posts to confirm their veracity before they are posted. In practical terms, it is not feasible for these enterprises to remove fake news by monitoring all posts. In the case of Facebook, the operator might remove a post if a third party reports it as offending the site's policy. Thus, the social media requires its own self-purification function. A large-sized social media enterprise may be able to devote adequate human resources to manually respond to all such reports from its users. However, this is not possible for all social media websites.

Thus, if we can calculate the reliability of the content posted online based on the feedback on social media, we might be able to protect innocent users from malicious ones. Various recent studies have focused on rumor detection or judgment of fake news on social media [22–28]. Most of these studies analyzed the contents or behaviors of the users or estimated the reliability of their remarks.

In the next section, we describe a method to analyze feedback provided for a post on social media.

#### **4. Feedback analysis methods**

Human relationships are important for a social media platform such as Twitter. By emphasizing the relationships among users, we consider whether a user can be evaluated by other users by analyzing their feedback. Next, we describe a method to analyze various elements of feedback provided via users' replies. The results of the analysis are used to investigate the relation between the information obtained from the reply text and the users' personalities estimated from the same texts. Based on this result, we analyze how the various types of feedback are related to the types of information diffusion. These findings will be useful to predict information diffusion from feedback contents. In this study, we analyze feedback tendency focusing on buzz tweets, flaming tweets, and the tweets by famous persons, using the methods described in the following subsections, namely, via the use of expressions of emotion in the Japanese language, emojis, emoticons, semantic vectors, latent Dirichlet allocation (LDA), information entropy, and personality analysis.

#### **4.1 Emotional expressions in the Japanese language**

There are various emotional expressions in the Japanese language. Therefore, even though the analysis of positive/negative emotions may appear to be comparatively simple, an emotion dictionary providing detailed information is necessary for such an analysis.

In this chapter, we use the Japanese Appraisal Evaluation Expression Dictionary (JAD) [29], which systematically registers Japanese emotional expressions, for our analysis. When we compare a word in the reply text with that in the dictionary, the manner of processing semantically similar words poses a problem. To solve this problem, we create a database of similar expressions using word-distributed representations that were trained using Wikipedia articles (fastText [30] + Wikipedia: 300 dimensions), and thus, we increase the number of expressions that can be matched. We determine the threshold as 0.6 and list similar expressions.

Examples of Japanese emotional expressions are shown in **Table 1**.

#### **4.2 Emoticons**

Web texts are sometimes annotated with emoticons, which serve as nonverbal information. The emoticon is also called a facemark, and in Japan especially, emoticons are very popularly used on bulletin boards and in e-mails. By annotating emoticons to

**155**

**Table 2.**

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy*

Positive Enchanting (*uttori*), festive (*ukareru*), enjoy (*tanoshimu*), etc.

**Word example (Japanese)**

a sentence, the emotion of the writer can be expressed easily. Many a time, an emoti-

Negative Become irate (*ikidooru*), pent-up rage (*uppun*), feel sadness (*kanashimu*), etc.

We detect the replies containing emoticons as annotations and analyze them by matching them against the emotions/meanings expressed by the emoticon. Examples of emoticons are shown in **Table 2**. The emotion categories of emoticon

Similar to emoticons, emojis are a form of nonverbal information annotated to web texts. Unlike emoticons, emojis corresponding to events, actions, as well as emotions are readily available pictographs of faces, objects, and symbols.

The varieties of available emojis differ depending on the SNS. In this study, we extract and analyze emojis used on Twitter. **Table 3** shows examples of emojis and their respective emotion categories. The emotion categories of emoji are joy, love,

It is helpful to refer to word semantic dictionaries to understand the contents written in the text. However, because existing word semantic dictionaries such as a thesaurus do not include many proper nouns, they are unsuitable for analyses of social media platforms such as Twitter. Thus, in this study, we analyze a semantic vector by a unit of reply based on distributed representations called Wikipedia entity vector [31], which was created by training relations of entities based on Wikipedia articles.

We also analyze the differences among the reply text sets by acquiring sentencedistributed representation vectors based on bidirectional encoder representations from transformer (BERT) [32], which has been attracting much attention in recent

con can communicate a nuance that cannot be conveyed easily with words.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

*Examples of Japanese emotional expression.*

are joy, shame, anger, sorrow, surprise, and hate.

anger, anxiety, sorrow, surprise, and neutral.

**4.4 Semantic vectors (Wiki2vec)**

*Examples of emoticons and their emotion categories.*

**4.3 Emojis**

**Emotion polarity**

**Table 1.**

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*


#### **Table 1.**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

this is not possible for all social media websites.

**4.1 Emotional expressions in the Japanese language**

post on social media.

such an analysis.

**4.2 Emoticons**

**4. Feedback analysis methods**

contents of posts to confirm their veracity before they are posted. In practical terms, it is not feasible for these enterprises to remove fake news by monitoring all posts. In the case of Facebook, the operator might remove a post if a third party reports it as offending the site's policy. Thus, the social media requires its own self-purification function. A large-sized social media enterprise may be able to devote adequate human resources to manually respond to all such reports from its users. However,

Thus, if we can calculate the reliability of the content posted online based on the

feedback on social media, we might be able to protect innocent users from malicious ones. Various recent studies have focused on rumor detection or judgment of fake news on social media [22–28]. Most of these studies analyzed the contents or

In the next section, we describe a method to analyze feedback provided for a

Human relationships are important for a social media platform such as Twitter. By emphasizing the relationships among users, we consider whether a user can be evaluated by other users by analyzing their feedback. Next, we describe a method to analyze various elements of feedback provided via users' replies. The results of the analysis are used to investigate the relation between the information obtained from the reply text and the users' personalities estimated from the same texts. Based on this result, we analyze how the various types of feedback are related to the types of information diffusion. These findings will be useful to predict information diffusion from feedback contents. In this study, we analyze feedback tendency focusing on buzz tweets, flaming tweets, and the tweets by famous persons, using the methods described in the following subsections, namely, via the use of expressions of emotion in the Japanese language, emojis, emoticons, semantic vectors, latent Dirichlet allocation (LDA), information entropy, and personality analysis.

There are various emotional expressions in the Japanese language. Therefore, even though the analysis of positive/negative emotions may appear to be comparatively simple, an emotion dictionary providing detailed information is necessary for

In this chapter, we use the Japanese Appraisal Evaluation Expression Dictionary (JAD) [29], which systematically registers Japanese emotional expressions, for our analysis. When we compare a word in the reply text with that in the dictionary, the manner of processing semantically similar words poses a problem. To solve this problem, we create a database of similar expressions using word-distributed representations that were trained using Wikipedia articles (fastText [30] + Wikipedia: 300 dimensions), and thus, we increase the number of expressions that can be matched. We determine the threshold as 0.6 and list similar expressions. Examples of Japanese emotional expressions are shown in **Table 1**.

Web texts are sometimes annotated with emoticons, which serve as nonverbal information. The emoticon is also called a facemark, and in Japan especially, emoticons are very popularly used on bulletin boards and in e-mails. By annotating emoticons to

behaviors of the users or estimated the reliability of their remarks.

**154**

*Examples of Japanese emotional expression.*

a sentence, the emotion of the writer can be expressed easily. Many a time, an emoticon can communicate a nuance that cannot be conveyed easily with words.

We detect the replies containing emoticons as annotations and analyze them by matching them against the emotions/meanings expressed by the emoticon. Examples of emoticons are shown in **Table 2**. The emotion categories of emoticon are joy, shame, anger, sorrow, surprise, and hate.

#### **4.3 Emojis**

Similar to emoticons, emojis are a form of nonverbal information annotated to web texts. Unlike emoticons, emojis corresponding to events, actions, as well as emotions are readily available pictographs of faces, objects, and symbols.

The varieties of available emojis differ depending on the SNS. In this study, we extract and analyze emojis used on Twitter. **Table 3** shows examples of emojis and their respective emotion categories. The emotion categories of emoji are joy, love, anger, anxiety, sorrow, surprise, and neutral.

#### **4.4 Semantic vectors (Wiki2vec)**

It is helpful to refer to word semantic dictionaries to understand the contents written in the text. However, because existing word semantic dictionaries such as a thesaurus do not include many proper nouns, they are unsuitable for analyses of social media platforms such as Twitter. Thus, in this study, we analyze a semantic vector by a unit of reply based on distributed representations called Wikipedia entity vector [31], which was created by training relations of entities based on Wikipedia articles.

We also analyze the differences among the reply text sets by acquiring sentencedistributed representation vectors based on bidirectional encoder representations from transformer (BERT) [32], which has been attracting much attention in recent


#### **Table 2.** *Examples of emoticons and their emotion categories.*


**Table 3.**

*Examples of emojis and their emotion categories.*

years. **Figure 1** shows the chart of BERT encoder. As preprocessing of input to the transformer encoder of BERT, the 15% of the word sequences are replaced to [MASK] tokens. The BERT tries to predict the meanings of the masked words based on non-masked words as context.

It is easy to apply BERT to the specific task by using fine-tuning. For example, in sentiment analysis, the sentiment classification model can be fine-tuned by adding the classification layer into the BERT structure.

#### **4.5 Topic analysis via latent Dirichlet allocation**

The topics of the posted contents can be analyzed by a topic modeling method. A recently proposed neural topic modeling method for topic analysis, called latent Dirichlet allocation [33], is a simple but effective approach. LDA topic modeling is often used to find topics from text data. LDA can be presented by a graphical model. **Figure 2** shows the LDA graphical model.

We analyze the differences between the sets of replies to buzz tweets, nonbuzz tweets, and flaming tweets by developing a topic distribution based on LDA.

**157**

**4.6 Information entropy**

**Figure 2.**

*LDA graphical model.*

**Figure 1.** *BERT encoder.*

The index of the amount of information can express the richness of the written contents. We identify the differences among the features by focusing on word appearance probability and calculating the information entropy for each reply. The information entropy for each reply is calculated using Eq. (1). *p*(*w*) indicates the

probability of the appearance of word w in the corpus.

H(R) = − ∑

*w*∈*R*

and it can be said that the buzz phenomenon is being occurred in the tweet.

The higher this index becomes, the more the information is expressed in the text. In other words, if the information entropy of the reply texts of the tweets is very high, it has plenty of topics to tell about the target tweets or the related topics,

*p*(*w*) log*p*(*w*) (1)

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy*

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

**Figure 1.** *BERT encoder.*

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

years. **Figure 1** shows the chart of BERT encoder. As preprocessing of input to the transformer encoder of BERT, the 15% of the word sequences are replaced to [MASK] tokens. The BERT tries to predict the meanings of the masked words based

It is easy to apply BERT to the specific task by using fine-tuning. For example, in sentiment analysis, the sentiment classification model can be fine-tuned by adding

The topics of the posted contents can be analyzed by a topic modeling method. A recently proposed neural topic modeling method for topic analysis, called latent Dirichlet allocation [33], is a simple but effective approach. LDA topic modeling is often used to find topics from text data. LDA can be presented by a graphical model.

We analyze the differences between the sets of replies to buzz tweets, non-

buzz tweets, and flaming tweets by developing a topic distribution based

on non-masked words as context.

*Examples of emojis and their emotion categories.*

the classification layer into the BERT structure.

**Figure 2** shows the LDA graphical model.

**4.5 Topic analysis via latent Dirichlet allocation**

**156**

on LDA.

**Table 3.**

#### **4.6 Information entropy**

The index of the amount of information can express the richness of the written contents. We identify the differences among the features by focusing on word appearance probability and calculating the information entropy for each reply. The information entropy for each reply is calculated using Eq. (1). *p*(*w*) indicates the probability of the appearance of word w in the corpus.

$$\text{H(R)} = -\sum\_{w \in R} p(w) \log p(w) \tag{1}$$

The higher this index becomes, the more the information is expressed in the text. In other words, if the information entropy of the reply texts of the tweets is very high, it has plenty of topics to tell about the target tweets or the related topics, and it can be said that the buzz phenomenon is being occurred in the tweet.

**Figure 3.** *System flow of personality analysis.*

#### **4.7 Personality analysis**

The personality of the user who posts replies should be more or less reflected in his/her posted contents. Thus, using the personality analysis model proposed by Matsumoto et al. [34], we analyze the user's personality based on the feedback of other users who responded to his/her post.

The personality estimation model proposed by Matsumoto et al. was trained using neural networks that employ the averaged word-distributed representation vector as the input feature, and it outputs the five levels of ego state. The system flow is shown in **Figure 3**. First, we collect the tweets by the Twitter users who posted egogram assessments according to the egogram assessment website by using Twitter API. Next, we create a sentence-distributed representation generation model by using PV-DBoW algorithm which was proposed by Le and Mikolov [35]. The ego-state level classifier is created based on machine learning algorithm such as deep neural networks. We used feedforward neural networks, which have three hidden layers using sentence-distributed representation as input feature.

#### **5. Results of the analysis**

We analyze the reply information using the seven methods described in the previous section. Also, we clarify the correlations between the features obtained from the analysis results and the metadata of the posted contents by correlation analysis. First, we prepare three kinds of data: buzz tweet, flaming tweet, and nonbuzz tweet.

A buzz tweet refers to diffused information, whereas a non-buzz tweet refers to diffused but neither buzz nor flaming information. A flaming tweet refers to

**159**

**Figure 5.**

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy*

negatively diffused information. We collect the contents of these three types of tweets, as well as the number of retweets and the number of favorites for each.

Number of tweets 150 150 20 Number of replies 13,120 14,313 2676 Average number of RT 30,253.58 2425 4931.2 Average number of FAV 80,845.77 12,924.96 16,619.5

**Buzz Non-buzz Flaming**

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

**Table 4.**

**Figure 4.**

*Summary of target data.*

**Table 4** shows the summary of the collected target data.

*Positive/negative analysis based on the Japanese appraisal dictionary.*

*Emotion analysis based on the Japanese appraisal dictionary.*

negatively diffused information. We collect the contents of these three types of tweets, as well as the number of retweets and the number of favorites for each. **Table 4** shows the summary of the collected target data.


**Table 4.** *Summary of target data.*

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

The personality of the user who posts replies should be more or less reflected in his/her posted contents. Thus, using the personality analysis model proposed by Matsumoto et al. [34], we analyze the user's personality based on the feedback of

The personality estimation model proposed by Matsumoto et al. was trained using neural networks that employ the averaged word-distributed representation vector as the input feature, and it outputs the five levels of ego state. The system flow is shown in **Figure 3**. First, we collect the tweets by the Twitter users who posted egogram assessments according to the egogram assessment website by using Twitter API. Next, we create a sentence-distributed representation generation model by using PV-DBoW algorithm which was proposed by Le and Mikolov [35]. The ego-state level classifier is created based on machine learning algorithm such as deep neural networks. We used feedforward neural networks, which have three hidden layers using sentence-distributed represen-

We analyze the reply information using the seven methods described in the previous section. Also, we clarify the correlations between the features obtained from the analysis results and the metadata of the posted contents by correlation analysis. First, we prepare three kinds of data: buzz tweet, flaming tweet, and non-

A buzz tweet refers to diffused information, whereas a non-buzz tweet refers to diffused but neither buzz nor flaming information. A flaming tweet refers to

**158**

buzz tweet.

**4.7 Personality analysis**

*System flow of personality analysis.*

**Figure 3.**

tation as input feature.

**5. Results of the analysis**

other users who responded to his/her post.

**Figure 4.** *Positive/negative analysis based on the Japanese appraisal dictionary.*

**Figure 5.** *Emotion analysis based on the Japanese appraisal dictionary.*

#### **5.1 Result 1: analysis using words/expressions showing emotion**

We conducted two types of analyses using the JAD. **Figure 4** shows the analysis result of the appearance probability of positive/negative emotion. **Figure 5** shows a more detailed analysis, which classifies the results into one of nine emotion categories. The classification shows a similar tendency between buzz and flaming tweets. In the case of non-buzz tweets, the vast majority consist of positive opinions about a famous person. In flaming tweets, negative and positive emotions are more and less frequent, respectively, than in buzz tweets, suggesting that the vast majority consists of negative opinions.

#### **5.2 Result 2: analysis using emoticons**

**Figure 6** shows the average scores obtained by considering emoticons and calculating their appearance frequencies for each reply in each reply set. This figure shows evidence of similar tendencies in the usage patterns of emoticons in the buzz, nonbuzz, and flaming tweets in spite of the differences in their appearance frequencies.

Almost all users using emoticons on Twitter do so to express positive emotions such as joy or love. Notably, these users use emoticons in almost every tweet, whereas the non-emoticon users almost never use them. Thus, we are of the opinion that it is not possible to obtain the correct result by analyzing feedback containing only emoticons.

#### **5.3 Result 3: analysis using emojis**

**Figure 7** shows the average scores obtained by considering emotions expressed by emojis and calculating emoji frequency for each reply set. This result shows that as with the emojis, the appearance patterns are similar in each category, but differences exist with regard to the total appearance frequencies. Thus, it is possible that we might not be able to grasp the tendency of information diffusion by analyzing the feedback based on emojis alone.

**161**

**Table 5.**

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy*

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

**5.4 Result 4: analysis using information entropy**

**5.5 Result 5: analysis using semantic vectors**

and Wiki2vec) for each reply.

the following two steps:

**Figure 7.**

*Emoji analysis result for each reply set.*

(t-SNE) [36].

*Word entropy for each type of tweet.*

**Table 5** shows the average information entropies for the three types of tweets (buzz, non-buzz, and flaming) by calculating the amount of information diffused

It is possible that the average entropy of the non-buzz tweets was low because the feedback contained many short sentences (such as encouraging messages or greetings containing less information). This result suggests that we can classify tweets into buzz, flaming, or non-buzz tweets based on information entropy.

The procedure for analyzing the feedback via the semantic vectors consists of

1.We obtain the semantic vectors (BERT, Wiki2vec, and the joint vector of BERT

2.For each label, we conduct clustering by k-means and plot centroid vectors in the two-dimensional space using t-distributed stochastic neighbor embedding

**Type Word entropy** Buzz 5.302469 Non-buzz 2.417621 Flaming 5.446601

from the sets of replies for each tweet (i.e., word entropy calculation).

**Figure 6.** *Emoticon analysis result for each reply set.*

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

**Figure 7.** *Emoji analysis result for each reply set.*

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

**5.1 Result 1: analysis using words/expressions showing emotion**

consists of negative opinions.

only emoticons.

**5.2 Result 2: analysis using emoticons**

**5.3 Result 3: analysis using emojis**

the feedback based on emojis alone.

We conducted two types of analyses using the JAD. **Figure 4** shows the analysis result of the appearance probability of positive/negative emotion. **Figure 5** shows a more detailed analysis, which classifies the results into one of nine emotion categories. The classification shows a similar tendency between buzz and flaming tweets. In the case of non-buzz tweets, the vast majority consist of positive opinions about a famous person. In flaming tweets, negative and positive emotions are more and less frequent, respectively, than in buzz tweets, suggesting that the vast majority

**Figure 6** shows the average scores obtained by considering emoticons and calculating their appearance frequencies for each reply in each reply set. This figure shows evidence of similar tendencies in the usage patterns of emoticons in the buzz, nonbuzz, and flaming tweets in spite of the differences in their appearance frequencies. Almost all users using emoticons on Twitter do so to express positive emotions such as joy or love. Notably, these users use emoticons in almost every tweet, whereas the non-emoticon users almost never use them. Thus, we are of the opinion that it is not possible to obtain the correct result by analyzing feedback containing

**Figure 7** shows the average scores obtained by considering emotions expressed by emojis and calculating emoji frequency for each reply set. This result shows that as with the emojis, the appearance patterns are similar in each category, but differences exist with regard to the total appearance frequencies. Thus, it is possible that we might not be able to grasp the tendency of information diffusion by analyzing

**160**

**Figure 6.**

*Emoticon analysis result for each reply set.*

#### **5.4 Result 4: analysis using information entropy**

**Table 5** shows the average information entropies for the three types of tweets (buzz, non-buzz, and flaming) by calculating the amount of information diffused from the sets of replies for each tweet (i.e., word entropy calculation).

It is possible that the average entropy of the non-buzz tweets was low because the feedback contained many short sentences (such as encouraging messages or greetings containing less information). This result suggests that we can classify tweets into buzz, flaming, or non-buzz tweets based on information entropy.

#### **5.5 Result 5: analysis using semantic vectors**

The procedure for analyzing the feedback via the semantic vectors consists of the following two steps:



**Table 5.** *Word entropy for each type of tweet.*

#### *Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

**Figure 8.** *Plotting by BERT vector.*

**Figure 9.** *Plotting by Wiki2vec vector.*

**Figures 8**–**10** show the results of the visualization of each semantic vector. We use pre-trained 768 dimension vectors that are fine-tuned based on a Wikipedia article in Japanese [37]. The training corpus for Wiki2vec also comprises Wikipedia articles in Japanese, and the number of dimensions is 100. The number of dimensions for the joint vector is 868 after concatenating the 768 dimensions of the BERT vector with the 100 dimensions of the Wiki2vec vector.

When using the BERT vector, no significant differences are noted among the flaming, buzz, and non-buzz tweets. However, the visualization results of the wiki2vec and joint vectors show that replies characterizing flaming are clearly distinguishable from the other replies. We attribute this result to the fact that Wiki2vec targets the entity vector (such as proper nouns), whereas BERT is trained to identify versatile distributed representations. That is, there is a possibility that

**163**

**Figure 10.**

**Figure 11.**

*Plotting by BERT+Wiki2vec vector.*

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy*

specific proper nouns (such as derogatory terms for targets under attack or names of the persons concerned) were frequently used in the replies to the flaming tweets.

We conduct topic modeling with LDA for the numbers of topics (in this case, 10 and 20). To judge the quality of a topic model, a scale called perplexity is often used. The perplexity of the topic model is calculated for each number of topics using Eq. (2). A lower perplexity denotes a more accurate probability model. In the equation, p(wd) indicates the probability of appearance of word w in document d. N indicates

> \_1 *<sup>N</sup>* <sup>∑</sup> *d*

log*p*(*wd*)

) (2)

perplexity(*Wtest*|*M*) = exp (<sup>−</sup>

**5.6 Result 6: analysis by topic modeling**

*Word cloud made by LDA model: number of topics is 10.*

the total number of words.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

**Figure 10.** *Plotting by BERT+Wiki2vec vector.*

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

**Figures 8**–**10** show the results of the visualization of each semantic vector. We use pre-trained 768 dimension vectors that are fine-tuned based on a Wikipedia article in Japanese [37]. The training corpus for Wiki2vec also comprises Wikipedia articles in Japanese, and the number of dimensions is 100. The number of dimensions for the joint vector is 868 after concatenating the 768 dimensions of the BERT

When using the BERT vector, no significant differences are noted among the flaming, buzz, and non-buzz tweets. However, the visualization results of the wiki2vec and joint vectors show that replies characterizing flaming are clearly distinguishable from the other replies. We attribute this result to the fact that Wiki2vec targets the entity vector (such as proper nouns), whereas BERT is trained to identify versatile distributed representations. That is, there is a possibility that

vector with the 100 dimensions of the Wiki2vec vector.

**162**

**Figure 9.**

*Plotting by Wiki2vec vector.*

**Figure 8.**

*Plotting by BERT vector.*

**Figure 11.** *Word cloud made by LDA model: number of topics is 10.*

specific proper nouns (such as derogatory terms for targets under attack or names of the persons concerned) were frequently used in the replies to the flaming tweets.

#### **5.6 Result 6: analysis by topic modeling**

We conduct topic modeling with LDA for the numbers of topics (in this case, 10 and 20). To judge the quality of a topic model, a scale called perplexity is often used. The perplexity of the topic model is calculated for each number of topics using Eq. (2). A lower perplexity denotes a more accurate probability model. In the equation, p(wd) indicates the probability of appearance of word w in document d. N indicates the total number of words.

$$\text{perplexity}(\mathcal{W}^{\text{test}}|M) = \exp\left(-\frac{1}{N} \sum\_{d} \log p\left(w\_d\right)\right) \tag{2}$$

#### *Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

**Figure 12.** *Word cloud made by LDA model: number of topics is 20.*

**165**

**Figure 15.**

*Result of personality analysis.*

**Figure 14.**

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy*

**Figures 11** and **12** show the word clouds made using the word appearance probability for each topic. These figures show that many positive words appeared in the feedback, which indicates that the number of the flaming tweets is small. **Figures 13** and **14** show the topic vectors, which are compressed into the twodimensional space by t-SNE, for each reply. Even though a number of examples

When the number of topics is 10, multiple different clusters are generated for the buzz and non-buzz tweets. Even though similar topics are sometimes generated for both buzz and non-buzz tweets, dissimilar topics tend to be generated more often.

Sets of replies are estimated for the buzz, non-buzz, and flaming tweets using neural networks. The result for the personality estimation is obtained as a vector

exist for replies to flaming tweets, they are widely distributed.

**5.7 Result 7: analysis using personality estimation**

*Plotting based on LDA topic vector: number of topics is 20.*

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

**Figure 13.** *Plotting based on LDA topic vector: number of topics is 10.*

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

**Figure 14.** *Plotting based on LDA topic vector: number of topics is 20.*

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

**164**

**Figure 13.**

**Figure 12.**

*Word cloud made by LDA model: number of topics is 20.*

*Plotting based on LDA topic vector: number of topics is 10.*

**Figures 11** and **12** show the word clouds made using the word appearance probability for each topic. These figures show that many positive words appeared in the feedback, which indicates that the number of the flaming tweets is small.

**Figures 13** and **14** show the topic vectors, which are compressed into the twodimensional space by t-SNE, for each reply. Even though a number of examples exist for replies to flaming tweets, they are widely distributed.

When the number of topics is 10, multiple different clusters are generated for the buzz and non-buzz tweets. Even though similar topics are sometimes generated for both buzz and non-buzz tweets, dissimilar topics tend to be generated more often.

#### **5.7 Result 7: analysis using personality estimation**

Sets of replies are estimated for the buzz, non-buzz, and flaming tweets using neural networks. The result for the personality estimation is obtained as a vector

**Figure 15.** *Result of personality analysis.*

that indicates five types of ego-state degrees. We call this vector the ego-state vector. The personality pattern is classified into 29 kinds as per the shape of the ego-state vector. **Figure 15** shows the proportions of the buzz, non-buzz, and flaming tweets for each personality pattern (**Table 6**).

**167**

**Conflict of interest**

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy*

Considerable variations in personality patterns are noted for the non-buzz tweets, while a biased tendency is observed for the buzz and flaming tweets. Notably, three non-buzz tweets and one flaming tweet are classified under rN\_1, which denotes a critical and idealistic personality. In other words, these users criticized the poster of the original tweet for his/her lack of a sense of justice. The

However, only one buzz tweet was classified as the "trapezoid\_2" type. This personality type is self-sacrificing and tends to devote himself/herself to the causes of others. Therefore, it is considered that the users used decent expressions because

The results of the analysis show that it is important to analyze feedback from multiple viewpoints. As it is difficult to gain a precise understanding of others' opinions from nonverbal expressions such as emoticons or emojis only, it is crucial to use a method that analyzes both verbal and nonverbal information. The feedback analysis method proposed in this study can successfully analyze reply texts containing words as the analysis algorithm is based on natural language text. Therefore, we believe that a sufficient amount of feedback from flaming and buzz tweets can be

However, the number of replies to buzz tweets is proportional to the degree of the buzz phenomenon. This poses a problem in that we cannot collect and analyze all the replies because the number of replies is very large for certain flaming tweets. Thus, to investigate the factors affecting flaming and buzz tweets in more detail, we should analyze the correlation between the follow-follower and the contents of the

In this chapter, we focused on information diffusion on social media and described a method to analyze feedback to specific tweets. We investigated the semantic/sensibility differences among three types of tweets—buzz, non-buzz, and flaming tweets—by analyzing replies to the posts. The results confirm the possibility of classifying the diffusion type accurately using semantic information included in the replies. However, with regard to expressions of emotion or sympathy, because we focused only on emotions that can be expressed by words, we detected many

Our results also showed that negative opinions tend to be common in the feedback to flaming tweets compared to that for buzz tweets. Flaming can cause harassment and cyberbullying and destroy personal relationship. These expressions should be detected by automatic classification systems such as flaming detectors based on artificial intelligence model, sentiment analysis model, or personality analysis model. However, buzz phenomenon and flaming phenomenon are similar in terms of information diffusion. Thus, in the future, we plan to construct an algorithm to analyze the differences between the two by considering specific conditions for each type of tweet.

positive opinions, but significant differences were not observed.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

statements by such users often cause flaming.

**6. Discussions**

reply texts.

**7. Conclusions**

obtained using our method.

they were moved by the contents of the buzz tweet.

**Table 6.** *A part of egogram patterns.*

#### *Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

Considerable variations in personality patterns are noted for the non-buzz tweets, while a biased tendency is observed for the buzz and flaming tweets. Notably, three non-buzz tweets and one flaming tweet are classified under rN\_1, which denotes a critical and idealistic personality. In other words, these users criticized the poster of the original tweet for his/her lack of a sense of justice. The statements by such users often cause flaming.

However, only one buzz tweet was classified as the "trapezoid\_2" type. This personality type is self-sacrificing and tends to devote himself/herself to the causes of others. Therefore, it is considered that the users used decent expressions because they were moved by the contents of the buzz tweet.

#### **6. Discussions**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

for each personality pattern (**Table 6**).

that indicates five types of ego-state degrees. We call this vector the ego-state vector. The personality pattern is classified into 29 kinds as per the shape of the ego-state vector. **Figure 15** shows the proportions of the buzz, non-buzz, and flaming tweets

**166**

**Table 6.**

*A part of egogram patterns.*

The results of the analysis show that it is important to analyze feedback from multiple viewpoints. As it is difficult to gain a precise understanding of others' opinions from nonverbal expressions such as emoticons or emojis only, it is crucial to use a method that analyzes both verbal and nonverbal information. The feedback analysis method proposed in this study can successfully analyze reply texts containing words as the analysis algorithm is based on natural language text. Therefore, we believe that a sufficient amount of feedback from flaming and buzz tweets can be obtained using our method.

However, the number of replies to buzz tweets is proportional to the degree of the buzz phenomenon. This poses a problem in that we cannot collect and analyze all the replies because the number of replies is very large for certain flaming tweets. Thus, to investigate the factors affecting flaming and buzz tweets in more detail, we should analyze the correlation between the follow-follower and the contents of the reply texts.

#### **7. Conclusions**

In this chapter, we focused on information diffusion on social media and described a method to analyze feedback to specific tweets. We investigated the semantic/sensibility differences among three types of tweets—buzz, non-buzz, and flaming tweets—by analyzing replies to the posts. The results confirm the possibility of classifying the diffusion type accurately using semantic information included in the replies. However, with regard to expressions of emotion or sympathy, because we focused only on emotions that can be expressed by words, we detected many positive opinions, but significant differences were not observed.

Our results also showed that negative opinions tend to be common in the feedback to flaming tweets compared to that for buzz tweets. Flaming can cause harassment and cyberbullying and destroy personal relationship. These expressions should be detected by automatic classification systems such as flaming detectors based on artificial intelligence model, sentiment analysis model, or personality analysis model. However, buzz phenomenon and flaming phenomenon are similar in terms of information diffusion. Thus, in the future, we plan to construct an algorithm to analyze the differences between the two by considering specific conditions for each type of tweet.

#### **Conflict of interest**

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

#### **Author details**

Kazuyuki Matsumoto\*, Minoru Yoshida and Kenji Kita Tokushima University, Tokushima, Japan

\*Address all correspondence to: matumoto@is.tokushima-u.ac.jp

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

**169**

(ICCCI); 2016

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy*

[8] Shukla SSP, Nitin, Singh SP, Parande NS, Khare A, Pandey NK. Flame detector model: A prototype for detecting flames in social networking sites. In: 2012 UKSim 14th International Conference on Computer Modelling and

and group norms on aggressive language use in online comments. Social Media+Society. 2016:1-13. DOI:

10.1177/2056305116664220

[11] Alsuwaidan L, Ykhlef M.

[12] Jiang J, Wen S, Yu S, Xiang Y, Zhou W. K-center: An approach on the multi-source identification of information diffusion. IEEE

[13] Kazama K, Imada M,

WI-IAT.2010.130

pp. 1-4

[9] Rösner L, Krämer NC. Verbal venting in the social web: Effects of anonymity

[10] Sri Nandhini B, Sheeba JI. Online social network bullying detection using intelligence techniques. Procedia Computer Science.

Information diffusion predictive model using radiation transfer. IEEE Access.

Transactions on Information Forensics and Security. 2015;**10**(12):2616-2626

Kashiwagi K. Characteristics estimation of information sources by information diffusion analysis. In: 2010 IEEE/ WIC/ACM International Conference on Web Intelligence and Intelligent Agent Technology; 2010. DOI: 10.1109/

[14] Murakami A, Suzuki H. Predicting information diffusion in Twitter through retweeting behaviors. In: The 26th Annual Conference of the Japanese Society for Artificial Intelligence; 2012.

[15] Saito K, Kimura M, Ohara K,

Motoda H. Learning asynchronous-time

Simulation; 2012

2015;**45**:485-492

2017;**5**:25946-25957

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

[2] Zamani S, Asadpour M, Moazzami D. Rumor detection for Persian Tweets. In: 2017 Iranian Conference on Electrical Engineering (ICEE). 2017. DOI: 10.1109/

[3] Aramaki E, Maskawa S, Morita M, Morita M. Microblog-based infectious disease detection using document classification and infectious disease model. Journal of Natural Language Processing. 2012;**19**(5):419-435

[4] KaiShu AS, Wang S, Tang J, Liu H. Fake news detection on social media: A data mining perspective. ACM SIGKDD Explorations Newsletter.

Procedia Computer Science.

[6] Yoshida S, Kitazono J, Ozawa S, Sugawara T, Haga T, Nakamura S. Sentiment analysis for various SNS media using Naïve Bayes classifier and its application to flaming detection. In: 2014 IEEE Symposium on Computational Intelligence in Big Data (CIBD); 2014. DOI: 10.1109/

[5] Aldwairi M, Alwahedi A. Detecting fake news in social media networks.

2017;**19**(1):22-36

2018;**141**:215-222

CIBD.2014.7011523

[7] Vinupriya A, Gomathi S. Web page personalization and link

prediction using generalized inverted index and flame clustering. In: 2016 International Conference on Computer Communication and Informatics

[1] Takahashi T, Igata N. Rumor detection on twitter. In: 2012 Joint 6th International Conference on Soft Computing and Intelligent Systems (SCIS) and 13th International Symposium on Advanced Intelligent Systems (ISIS). 2012. DOI: 10.1109/

SCIS-ISIS.2012.6505254

IranianCEE.2017.7985287

**References**

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

#### **References**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

**168**

**Author details**

Kazuyuki Matsumoto\*, Minoru Yoshida and Kenji Kita

\*Address all correspondence to: matumoto@is.tokushima-u.ac.jp

© 2019 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,

Tokushima University, Tokushima, Japan

provided the original work is properly cited.

[1] Takahashi T, Igata N. Rumor detection on twitter. In: 2012 Joint 6th International Conference on Soft Computing and Intelligent Systems (SCIS) and 13th International Symposium on Advanced Intelligent Systems (ISIS). 2012. DOI: 10.1109/ SCIS-ISIS.2012.6505254

[2] Zamani S, Asadpour M, Moazzami D. Rumor detection for Persian Tweets. In: 2017 Iranian Conference on Electrical Engineering (ICEE). 2017. DOI: 10.1109/ IranianCEE.2017.7985287

[3] Aramaki E, Maskawa S, Morita M, Morita M. Microblog-based infectious disease detection using document classification and infectious disease model. Journal of Natural Language Processing. 2012;**19**(5):419-435

[4] KaiShu AS, Wang S, Tang J, Liu H. Fake news detection on social media: A data mining perspective. ACM SIGKDD Explorations Newsletter. 2017;**19**(1):22-36

[5] Aldwairi M, Alwahedi A. Detecting fake news in social media networks. Procedia Computer Science. 2018;**141**:215-222

[6] Yoshida S, Kitazono J, Ozawa S, Sugawara T, Haga T, Nakamura S. Sentiment analysis for various SNS media using Naïve Bayes classifier and its application to flaming detection. In: 2014 IEEE Symposium on Computational Intelligence in Big Data (CIBD); 2014. DOI: 10.1109/ CIBD.2014.7011523

[7] Vinupriya A, Gomathi S. Web page personalization and link prediction using generalized inverted index and flame clustering. In: 2016 International Conference on Computer Communication and Informatics (ICCCI); 2016

[8] Shukla SSP, Nitin, Singh SP, Parande NS, Khare A, Pandey NK. Flame detector model: A prototype for detecting flames in social networking sites. In: 2012 UKSim 14th International Conference on Computer Modelling and Simulation; 2012

[9] Rösner L, Krämer NC. Verbal venting in the social web: Effects of anonymity and group norms on aggressive language use in online comments. Social Media+Society. 2016:1-13. DOI: 10.1177/2056305116664220

[10] Sri Nandhini B, Sheeba JI. Online social network bullying detection using intelligence techniques. Procedia Computer Science. 2015;**45**:485-492

[11] Alsuwaidan L, Ykhlef M. Information diffusion predictive model using radiation transfer. IEEE Access. 2017;**5**:25946-25957

[12] Jiang J, Wen S, Yu S, Xiang Y, Zhou W. K-center: An approach on the multi-source identification of information diffusion. IEEE Transactions on Information Forensics and Security. 2015;**10**(12):2616-2626

[13] Kazama K, Imada M, Kashiwagi K. Characteristics estimation of information sources by information diffusion analysis. In: 2010 IEEE/ WIC/ACM International Conference on Web Intelligence and Intelligent Agent Technology; 2010. DOI: 10.1109/ WI-IAT.2010.130

[14] Murakami A, Suzuki H. Predicting information diffusion in Twitter through retweeting behaviors. In: The 26th Annual Conference of the Japanese Society for Artificial Intelligence; 2012. pp. 1-4

[15] Saito K, Kimura M, Ohara K, Motoda H. Learning asynchronous-time information diffusion models and its application to behavioral data analysis over social networks. Journal of Computer Engineering and Informatics. 2013;**1**(2):30-57

[16] User chart. Available from: http:// userchart.jp/

[17] kred. Available from: https://home. kred/

[18] kuchikomi@kakaricho. Available from: https://service.hottolink.co.jp/ service/kakaricho/

[19] Liao Q, Wang W, Han Y, Zhang Q. Analyzing the influential people in Sina Weibo dataset. In: 2013 IEEE Global Communications Conference (GLOBECOM); 2013. DOI: 10.1109/GLOCOM.2013.6831542

[20] Matsuo Y, Yasuda Y. How relations are built within a SNS world—Social network analysis on Mixi. Transactions of the Japanese Society for Artificial Intelligence. 2007;**22**(5):531-541

[21] Tsugawa S, Kimura K. Identifying influencers from sampled social networks. Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications. 2018;**507**(1):294-303

[22] Castillo C, Mendoza M, Poblete B. Information credibility on twitter. In: Proceedings of WWW; 2011. pp. 675-684

[23] Kwon S, Cha M, Jung K, Chen W, Wang Y. Prominent features of rumor propagation in online social media. In: Proceedings of ICDM; 2013. pp. 1103-1108

[24] Liu X, Nourbakhsh A, Li Q, Fang R, Shah S. Real-time rumor debunking on twitter. In: Proceedings of the 24th ACM International on Conference on Information and Knowledge Management. CIKM '15; 2015. pp. 1867-1870

[25] Ma J, Gao W, Wong K-F. Detect rumors in microblog posts using propagation structure via kernel learning. In: Proceedings of the 55th Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics (Volume 1: Long Papers); 2017. pp. 708-717

[26] Buntain C, Golbeck J. Automatically identifying fake news in popular Twitter threads. In: 2017 IEEE International Conference on Smart Cloud (SmartCloud); 2017. DOI: 10.1109/ SmartCloud.2017.40

[27] Ajao Q, Bhowmik D, Zargari S. Fake news identification on Twitter with hybrid CNN and RNN models. In: Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Social Media and Society (SMSociety'18); 2018. pp. 226-230

[28] Helmstetter S, Paulheim H. Weakly supervised learning for fake news detection on Twitter. In: IEEE/ACM International Conference on Advances in Social Networks Analysis and Mining (ASONAM); 2018. DOI: 10.1109/ asonam.2018.8508520

[29] Sano M. Reconstructing English system of attitude for the application to Japanese: An exploration for the construction of a Japanese dictionary of appraisal. In: 38th International Systemic Functional Congress; 2011

[30] Joulin A, Grave E, Bojanowski P, Mikolov T. Bag of tricks for efficient text classification. In: Proceedings of the 15th Conference of the European Chapter of the Association for Computational Linguistics; 2016. Volume 2, pp. 427-431

[31] Japanese Wikipedia Entity Vector. Available from: http://www.cl.ecei. tohoku.ac.jp/~m-suzuki/jawiki\_vector/

[32] Devlin J, Chang M-W, Lee K, Toutanova K. BERT: Pre-training of Deep Bidirectional Transformers for Language Understanding; 2018. arXiv:1810.04805

**171**

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy*

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

[33] Blei DM, Lafferty DJ. Text Mining: Theory and Applications, Chapter Topic Models. UK: Taylor and Francis; 2009

[34] Matsumoto K, Tanaka S, Yoshida M, Kita K, Ren F. Ego-state estimation from short texts based on sentence distributed representation. International Journal of Advanced Intelligence (IJAI). 2017;**9**(2):145-161

[35] Le Q , Mikolov T. Distributed representations of sentences and documents. In: Proceedings of the 31st International Conference on Machine Learning, PMLR. 2014;**32**(2):1188-1196

[36] Laurens V, Maaten D, Hinton G. Visualizing data using t-SNE. Journal of Machine Learning Research.

[37] BERT Japanese Pretrained Model. Available from: http://nlp.ist.i.kyotou. ac.jp/index.php?BERT%E6%97%A5%E 6%9C%AC%E8%AA%9EPretrained%E 3%83%A2%E3%83%87%E3%83%AB

2008;**9**:2579-2605

*Analysis of Information Spreading by Social Media Based on Emotion and Empathy DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.88886*

[33] Blei DM, Lafferty DJ. Text Mining: Theory and Applications, Chapter Topic Models. UK: Taylor and Francis; 2009

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

[25] Ma J, Gao W, Wong K-F. Detect rumors in microblog posts using propagation structure via kernel learning. In: Proceedings of the 55th Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics (Volume 1: Long Papers); 2017. pp. 708-717

[26] Buntain C, Golbeck J. Automatically identifying fake news in popular Twitter threads. In: 2017 IEEE International

[27] Ajao Q, Bhowmik D, Zargari S. Fake news identification on Twitter with hybrid CNN and RNN models. In: Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Social Media and Society (SMSociety'18); 2018. pp. 226-230

[28] Helmstetter S, Paulheim H. Weakly supervised learning for fake news detection on Twitter. In: IEEE/ACM International Conference on Advances in Social Networks Analysis and Mining

(ASONAM); 2018. DOI: 10.1109/

[29] Sano M. Reconstructing English system of attitude for the application to Japanese: An exploration for the construction of a Japanese dictionary of appraisal. In: 38th International Systemic Functional Congress; 2011

[30] Joulin A, Grave E, Bojanowski P, Mikolov T. Bag of tricks for efficient text classification. In: Proceedings of the 15th Conference of the European Chapter of the Association for Computational Linguistics; 2016.

[31] Japanese Wikipedia Entity Vector. Available from: http://www.cl.ecei. tohoku.ac.jp/~m-suzuki/jawiki\_vector/

[32] Devlin J, Chang M-W, Lee K, Toutanova K. BERT: Pre-training of Deep Bidirectional Transformers for Language Understanding; 2018.

asonam.2018.8508520

Volume 2, pp. 427-431

arXiv:1810.04805

Conference on Smart Cloud (SmartCloud); 2017. DOI: 10.1109/

SmartCloud.2017.40

information diffusion models and its application to behavioral data analysis over social networks. Journal of

2013;**1**(2):30-57

userchart.jp/

service/kakaricho/

[19] Liao Q, Wang W, Han Y, Zhang Q. Analyzing the influential people in Sina Weibo dataset. In: 2013 IEEE Global Communications Conference (GLOBECOM); 2013. DOI: 10.1109/GLOCOM.2013.6831542

kred/

Computer Engineering and Informatics.

[16] User chart. Available from: http://

[17] kred. Available from: https://home.

[18] kuchikomi@kakaricho. Available from: https://service.hottolink.co.jp/

[20] Matsuo Y, Yasuda Y. How relations are built within a SNS world—Social network analysis on Mixi. Transactions of the Japanese Society for Artificial Intelligence. 2007;**22**(5):531-541

[21] Tsugawa S, Kimura K. Identifying influencers from sampled social networks. Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications.

[22] Castillo C, Mendoza M, Poblete B. Information credibility on twitter. In: Proceedings of WWW; 2011.

[23] Kwon S, Cha M, Jung K, Chen W, Wang Y. Prominent features of rumor propagation in online social media. In: Proceedings of ICDM; 2013.

[24] Liu X, Nourbakhsh A, Li Q, Fang R, Shah S. Real-time rumor debunking on twitter. In: Proceedings of the 24th ACM International on Conference on Information and Knowledge Management. CIKM '15; 2015.

2018;**507**(1):294-303

pp. 675-684

pp. 1103-1108

pp. 1867-1870

**170**

[34] Matsumoto K, Tanaka S, Yoshida M, Kita K, Ren F. Ego-state estimation from short texts based on sentence distributed representation. International Journal of Advanced Intelligence (IJAI). 2017;**9**(2):145-161

[35] Le Q , Mikolov T. Distributed representations of sentences and documents. In: Proceedings of the 31st International Conference on Machine Learning, PMLR. 2014;**32**(2):1188-1196

[36] Laurens V, Maaten D, Hinton G. Visualizing data using t-SNE. Journal of Machine Learning Research. 2008;**9**:2579-2605

[37] BERT Japanese Pretrained Model. Available from: http://nlp.ist.i.kyotou. ac.jp/index.php?BERT%E6%97%A5%E 6%9C%AC%E8%AA%9EPretrained%E 3%83%A2%E3%83%87%E3%83%AB

**173**

**Chapter 10**

**Abstract**

"Packaged Cuba"

Cultural Studies in Latin America:

*Martín Oller Alonso and José Raúl Concepción Llanes*

The new information and communication technologies (ICT) have both changed the ways of practicing journalism and the lifestyles of the global society. In this context, media have been considered important diffusion instruments of the values and dominant ideology. In turn, evidence of the dominance of the "cultural industry" of the United States in Latin America increased. In Cuba, with the triumph of the Revolution in January 1959, the media landscape changed against western ideological hegemony, and with the help of media, the ICAIC and the ICRT, the new government defended the revolutionary ideas through control of the cultural industry. The new political strategies covered all systems in Cuba, adopting a speech aimed at maintaining revolutionary ideas and, subsequently, socialist ideals. Nowadays, the communicational, journalistic, technological and digital scenario in Cuba depends, more than ever before in the revolutionary stage, on the current political landscape "post-Castro" due to the ratification of Miguel Díaz-Canel as its new president and the period of constitutional renewal between August 13 and November 15, 2018. A new context, where the alternative consumption of cultural, informative and entertainment products is a visible phenomenon in Cuban society, and the *Paquete Semanal* (weekly package) is the best exponent, is the greatest chal-

lenge that the revolutionary ideology in Cuba has faced.

Cuban alternative media, ICT

the dominant social processes" (p. 3).

**1. Introduction**

**Keywords:** Latin America, cultural studies, Cuba, *Paquete Semanal*,

Since the end of the twentieth century, the new information and communication technology (ICT) have changed the ways of practicing journalism and the lifestyles of global society. Despite the digital divide, the underdeveloped and developing countries have also been transformed by ICT and the evolution of it. In the age of the internet and micro-screens, a whole generation of new communication professionals and young people marked by the use of these technologies has grown up. Specifically, the ways of consuming cultural products and the media have undergone a major renovation following the substantial rise in the use of personal computers, Internet and smartphones. At the start of the new millennium, Castells [1] called attention to the structural changes caused by ICT and the emergence of a new global society based on the establishment of networks: "The convergence of social evolution and technology has created a new base for carrying out activities throughout the social structure. This material base, composed of networks, marks

#### **Chapter 10**

## Cultural Studies in Latin America: "Packaged Cuba"

*Martín Oller Alonso and José Raúl Concepción Llanes*

#### **Abstract**

The new information and communication technologies (ICT) have both changed the ways of practicing journalism and the lifestyles of the global society. In this context, media have been considered important diffusion instruments of the values and dominant ideology. In turn, evidence of the dominance of the "cultural industry" of the United States in Latin America increased. In Cuba, with the triumph of the Revolution in January 1959, the media landscape changed against western ideological hegemony, and with the help of media, the ICAIC and the ICRT, the new government defended the revolutionary ideas through control of the cultural industry. The new political strategies covered all systems in Cuba, adopting a speech aimed at maintaining revolutionary ideas and, subsequently, socialist ideals. Nowadays, the communicational, journalistic, technological and digital scenario in Cuba depends, more than ever before in the revolutionary stage, on the current political landscape "post-Castro" due to the ratification of Miguel Díaz-Canel as its new president and the period of constitutional renewal between August 13 and November 15, 2018. A new context, where the alternative consumption of cultural, informative and entertainment products is a visible phenomenon in Cuban society, and the *Paquete Semanal* (weekly package) is the best exponent, is the greatest challenge that the revolutionary ideology in Cuba has faced.

**Keywords:** Latin America, cultural studies, Cuba, *Paquete Semanal*, Cuban alternative media, ICT

#### **1. Introduction**

Since the end of the twentieth century, the new information and communication technology (ICT) have changed the ways of practicing journalism and the lifestyles of global society. Despite the digital divide, the underdeveloped and developing countries have also been transformed by ICT and the evolution of it. In the age of the internet and micro-screens, a whole generation of new communication professionals and young people marked by the use of these technologies has grown up. Specifically, the ways of consuming cultural products and the media have undergone a major renovation following the substantial rise in the use of personal computers, Internet and smartphones. At the start of the new millennium, Castells [1] called attention to the structural changes caused by ICT and the emergence of a new global society based on the establishment of networks: "The convergence of social evolution and technology has created a new base for carrying out activities throughout the social structure. This material base, composed of networks, marks the dominant social processes" (p. 3).

Even today, and supported by ICT and their high inclusion power, in Latin America, an "imperialist culture" is maintained, defined by Petras ([2], p. 145) as "the systematic penetration of the rules of the dominant classes of the West" and based on "the significant construction of social acts and the historical particularity of human culture" ([3], p. 22). McLuhan suggests the complete ecological unity that exists in the interaction between the physics of the media and the metaphysics of culture [4].

In Cuba, not only journalists, but all of Cuban society, are inserted into a national context where there are major technological limitations, caused by the economic problems of the nation and, to a large extent, due to the isolation caused by the US embargo, tightened at the beginning of 2019 by US policies towards Cuba through the activation of Title III of the Helms-Burton Act by the Trump administration.

As a result of the dissolution of the USSR in 1991, Cuba lost its main market and underwent a deep economic crisis, which caused irreparable damage to the functioning of much of the media and all social spheres. During this period of time, called the "Special Period", old evils overcome by the 1959 Revolution returned to life on the Island: poverty, loss of moral values and development of the black market, among other adversities. These events marked "the beginning of a process that would shake the relative social homogeneity of life opportunities achieved" [5]. In this environment, the new technologies began to determine journalistic practice, the relationship between journalists and the Government, and the cultural and media consumption—as well as the "informal" consumption of contents.

In these circumstances, the "black market" became a consolidated space where distributors of audiovisual content in Cuba bypassed the media and the official cultural industry. In this way, the "banks"1 started to rent out movies in VHS format and the commercialization of the so-called "cables", which connected different houses to provide access to the same satellite antenna, then began the process of replacing VHS with DVDs as audiovisual support and "burners/sellers" of discs appeared. With this background, the so-called *Paquete Semanal* (Weekly Package) appeared almost a decade ago with the use of external storage disks *as a means of transfer of information/news*.

As part of this alternative consumption of cultural, informative and entertainment products, the *Paquete Semanal* is a product sold on USB storage devices and made primarily from illicit Internet downloads in state centers benefiting from broadband and the "capture" of videos using satellite television antennas. Within this black market of content distribution, parallel to the official media and government institutions, the *Paquete Semanal* has been sustained from its beginnings in a status of "pseudo-legality" or "a-legality".<sup>2</sup> A situation that has allowed its composition, distribution and consumption was carried out in an alternative way to the media and governmental and cultural institutions of the Cuban state.

#### **2. Cultural studies in Latin America**

Since the British Cultural studies placed context as a fundamental determinant to take into account in communication studies, it has become a fundamental

**175**

which it develops:

*the 'ideals' of development". ([10], p. 75)*

*Cultural Studies in Latin America: "Packaged Cuba" DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85920*

factual—can make of them.

element in the investigations that seek to establish the correlations between the different structural systems of a country. The Latin American perspective of cultural studies emphasizes the relationship between communication and culture because at the beginning of its implementation in the region, according to Mattelart and Neuveu [7], Latin America was still suffering the years of authoritarian regimes, or coming out of them to enter into the years of democratic transitions, between the failure of the progressive forces, not to mention the bloodshed that for the academic community lead to the tragic disappearance and exile of numerous researchers. As a consequence, Latin American thinkers were challenged to amalgamate their theories from the logic of the intersections: history had to be understood at the same time as economy, the dependence of the time and the collaboration of local elites with the dominators; it was necessary to understand the popular and residual at its intersection with the processes of codification of the dominant culture [8]. In this way, the paradigm of active reception was transcended, in order to experiment with the educational, commercial, informative and, above all, political content of the mass media, not because of the content itself, but because of the influence it has on the audience and the use that the sources of power—both democratic and

From the 1980s, the new political winds of the continent led to major breakdowns and theoretical shifts, shaping the main contributions in the field of cultural studies in the region. Previously, the Cuban Revolution had triumphed in 1959, decades later progressive governments emerged in several Latin American countries. In this context, the media are considered as a real part of the processes of social reproduction and a critical activity begins to confront the theoretical and methodological heritage that generated profound epistemological changes and gave life to a new conception of communication in which the role of government was fundamental. The theory of dependence appears, to bring to coalition issues such as the cultural penetration of imperialism in the continent, the cultural dominance that the American way of life entailed, and the subordination and domination of native cultures, among others. This movement advocated by a New World Order of Information and Communication, in which underdeveloped countries should

establish national communication policies to protect cultural heritage.

The media were considered important diffusion instruments, by some, of the values and the dominant ideology; by others, of the modernization necessary to get out of underdevelopment [9]. In turn, evidence of the dominance of the "cultural industry" of the United States in Latin America accumulated. Despite any criticism for the Theory of Dependency, Gámez [9] points out how community radios, alternative newspapers and, in general, betting on popular communication appear as a means of stimulating the participation of the most exploited sectors. By understanding the cultural nature of mass communication, and legitimating it as a space for the production of meanings, the transmissive models are overcome and the active character of the individual is emphasized, whose consumption practices and meaning production will be conditioned by the sociohistorical environment in

*Latin America is not only a place of a radical critique of modernization theories applied to the dissemination of innovations in relation to peasants in the context of timid agrarian reforms, family planning policy or distance learning. It is a region that also produces "initiatives that break with the vertical mode of transmission of* 

In this new scenario, and after the fall of the utopias that signified the collapse of the socialist experiences, disbelief is generated in the rigid/absolute schemas/

<sup>1</sup> Stores specialized in the sale of audiovisual and digital material.

<sup>2</sup> Lindahl [6] in his book "Fault Lines of Globalization: Legal Order and the Politics of A-Legality" speaks about "a-legality" develops in five stages. In our proposal of "a-legality" we refer to the third stage, that describes how and why the strong dimension of a-legality reveals legal boundaries as normative fault lines

#### *Cultural Studies in Latin America: "Packaged Cuba" DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85920*

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

of culture [4].

administration.

cultural industry. In this way, the "banks"1

status of "pseudo-legality" or "a-legality".<sup>2</sup>

**2. Cultural studies in Latin America**

<sup>1</sup> Stores specialized in the sale of audiovisual and digital material.

*transfer of information/news*.

Even today, and supported by ICT and their high inclusion power, in Latin America, an "imperialist culture" is maintained, defined by Petras ([2], p. 145) as "the systematic penetration of the rules of the dominant classes of the West" and based on "the significant construction of social acts and the historical particularity of human culture" ([3], p. 22). McLuhan suggests the complete ecological unity that exists in the interaction between the physics of the media and the metaphysics

In Cuba, not only journalists, but all of Cuban society, are inserted into a national context where there are major technological limitations, caused by the economic problems of the nation and, to a large extent, due to the isolation caused by the US embargo, tightened at the beginning of 2019 by US policies towards Cuba through the activation of Title III of the Helms-Burton Act by the Trump

As a result of the dissolution of the USSR in 1991, Cuba lost its main market and underwent a deep economic crisis, which caused irreparable damage to the functioning of much of the media and all social spheres. During this period of time, called the "Special Period", old evils overcome by the 1959 Revolution returned to life on the Island: poverty, loss of moral values and development of the black market, among other adversities. These events marked "the beginning of a process that would shake the relative social homogeneity of life opportunities achieved" [5]. In this environment, the new technologies began to determine journalistic practice, the relationship between journalists and the Government, and the cultural and media consumption—as well as the "informal" consumption of contents.

In these circumstances, the "black market" became a consolidated space where distributors of audiovisual content in Cuba bypassed the media and the official

As part of this alternative consumption of cultural, informative and entertainment products, the *Paquete Semanal* is a product sold on USB storage devices and made primarily from illicit Internet downloads in state centers benefiting from broadband and the "capture" of videos using satellite television antennas. Within this black market of content distribution, parallel to the official media and government institutions, the *Paquete Semanal* has been sustained from its beginnings in a

tion, distribution and consumption was carried out in an alternative way to the

Since the British Cultural studies placed context as a fundamental determinant

to take into account in communication studies, it has become a fundamental

<sup>2</sup> Lindahl [6] in his book "Fault Lines of Globalization: Legal Order and the Politics of A-Legality" speaks about "a-legality" develops in five stages. In our proposal of "a-legality" we refer to the third stage, that describes how and why the strong dimension of a-legality reveals legal boundaries as norma-

media and governmental and cultural institutions of the Cuban state.

and the commercialization of the so-called "cables", which connected different houses to provide access to the same satellite antenna, then began the process of replacing VHS with DVDs as audiovisual support and "burners/sellers" of discs appeared. With this background, the so-called *Paquete Semanal* (Weekly Package) appeared almost a decade ago with the use of external storage disks *as a means of* 

started to rent out movies in VHS format

A situation that has allowed its composi-

**174**

tive fault lines

element in the investigations that seek to establish the correlations between the different structural systems of a country. The Latin American perspective of cultural studies emphasizes the relationship between communication and culture because at the beginning of its implementation in the region, according to Mattelart and Neuveu [7], Latin America was still suffering the years of authoritarian regimes, or coming out of them to enter into the years of democratic transitions, between the failure of the progressive forces, not to mention the bloodshed that for the academic community lead to the tragic disappearance and exile of numerous researchers. As a consequence, Latin American thinkers were challenged to amalgamate their theories from the logic of the intersections: history had to be understood at the same time as economy, the dependence of the time and the collaboration of local elites with the dominators; it was necessary to understand the popular and residual at its intersection with the processes of codification of the dominant culture [8]. In this way, the paradigm of active reception was transcended, in order to experiment with the educational, commercial, informative and, above all, political content of the mass media, not because of the content itself, but because of the influence it has on the audience and the use that the sources of power—both democratic and factual—can make of them.

From the 1980s, the new political winds of the continent led to major breakdowns and theoretical shifts, shaping the main contributions in the field of cultural studies in the region. Previously, the Cuban Revolution had triumphed in 1959, decades later progressive governments emerged in several Latin American countries. In this context, the media are considered as a real part of the processes of social reproduction and a critical activity begins to confront the theoretical and methodological heritage that generated profound epistemological changes and gave life to a new conception of communication in which the role of government was fundamental. The theory of dependence appears, to bring to coalition issues such as the cultural penetration of imperialism in the continent, the cultural dominance that the American way of life entailed, and the subordination and domination of native cultures, among others. This movement advocated by a New World Order of Information and Communication, in which underdeveloped countries should establish national communication policies to protect cultural heritage.

The media were considered important diffusion instruments, by some, of the values and the dominant ideology; by others, of the modernization necessary to get out of underdevelopment [9]. In turn, evidence of the dominance of the "cultural industry" of the United States in Latin America accumulated. Despite any criticism for the Theory of Dependency, Gámez [9] points out how community radios, alternative newspapers and, in general, betting on popular communication appear as a means of stimulating the participation of the most exploited sectors. By understanding the cultural nature of mass communication, and legitimating it as a space for the production of meanings, the transmissive models are overcome and the active character of the individual is emphasized, whose consumption practices and meaning production will be conditioned by the sociohistorical environment in which it develops:

*Latin America is not only a place of a radical critique of modernization theories applied to the dissemination of innovations in relation to peasants in the context of timid agrarian reforms, family planning policy or distance learning. It is a region that also produces "initiatives that break with the vertical mode of transmission of the 'ideals' of development". ([10], p. 75)*

In this new scenario, and after the fall of the utopias that signified the collapse of the socialist experiences, disbelief is generated in the rigid/absolute schemas/

conceptions. For this reason, the previous paradigms were questioned and the communication sciences, which had not managed to solve their methodological and epistemological challenges, began to reverse what they had held to be true. In this context, Jesús Martín-Barbero places "mediation" as one of the central and most systematic analytical categories within his studies. The theoretical proposal of this author opened the way to think about communication from two essential displacements: from media to mediations and from communication to culture.

Martín-Barbero [11] offers a broad conception of communication, which goes far beyond what concerns the media itself to the proposal that mediation becomes an essential category for analysis. This entails studying how culture is negotiated and how it is subject to transactions in a series of contexts, including cinema, popular press, television, radio, circus, musical performances and many others. Martín-Barbero suggests that the syncretic nature of popular practices is of great importance in Latin America. Such practices contribute both to preserve cultural identities and to adapt them to modern demands. Essentially, according to Schlesinger and Morris ([12], p. 8), "interest in mediations is a discourse on the formation of identities".

Some thinkers consider that the contribution of Martín-Barbero [11, 13–15] and García Canclini [16–21] has been fundamental in detecting the importance of the topic of "cultural consumption" at a time when the dominant preoccupation in the studies on culture and communication in Latin America was still the analysis of the messages in the mass media as a support of the "ideology of domination".

#### **3. Media speech in the digital context of the Revolutionary Cuba of the twenty-first century**

According to Olivera and Salas [22], the psychological and sociological perspectives of the revolutionary communicative maneuvers self-endorsed through "the mimetic contamination of the Cuban Social Sciences with the Marxist-Leninist theoretical currents arrived from the socialist field" (p. 5). The area of communication was doubly affected, because in the USSR this scientific field was not as developed as other fields. As a consequence of the importation of foreign models, these authors claim that "the autochthonous theoretical development, the critical examination of the different objects of study and the theoretical updating of the researchers was limited, and the existence of a left functionalism was generated" (p. 6); to the point where all scientific fields suffered from too strong a dependence on state guidelines: "The research practices were very permeated by the ideology assumed from the political power and less influenced by an epistemological vision" (p. 7). An affirmation that agrees with the criterion of Linares and Rivero ([23], p. 7): "The state played the role of regulator par excellence in the construction of spaces of equality in all the fundamental areas of life, including recreational—cultural".

This is a logic that, to this day in Cuba, continues to develop from more complex tactics and the increase of the new technological devices and the new discursive, relational and structural mediations between journalists, citizens and the government. For Castells [24], we live in a time that is expressed in a new information and communication system of global reach, of convergence of means and languages, and interactive, generated through the expansion of the internet and the new technologies of the information and communication, differentiated from the traditional media in regards to their reticular structure and digitalization. A context in which Canclini [20] especially emphasizes cyberspace as a sphere in which all types of language coexist and which has caused a readjustment in the ways of understanding communication and interpreting the sociocultural practices of the subjects: "This

**177**

and relaxation".

of ICTs at the population level".

*Cultural Studies in Latin America: "Packaged Cuba" DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85920*

population will not be fully manifested.

contamination between audience behaviors is even more versatile on the Internet,

At this point, it is important to clarify that, despite there being cultural policies directed from the state to expand the links between Cuban population, education, culture and revolutionary ideology, "there is no direct and unilateral relationship between institutional efforts and behavior of the subjects" ([20], p. 63). Cuba, like every country with scarce financial resources, is late to most of the technological advances. Hence, the well-known "digital gap", which separates the technological context of the developed world from territories with little monetary capital, has widened in the Island due to the policy of isolation of the revolutionary government itself and the economic embargo imposed on Cuba by the United States. Specifically, there is an external digital gap when compared with other nations, and

However, the relative absence of internet and other ICTs in Cuba does not have a high impact due to the high standard training of citizens in mathematical knowledge and reading and writing. A very important aspect to take into account is that the digital gap should not be measured only in terms of availability of technological resources, but also human resources and, in this sense, the Cuban population does not deviate far from the First World. According to Pedro Urra (2015, personal interview), it is not enough to own the equipment, it must also be known how to make the most of it. The most important issue does not lie in the possession of devices, because this is not as serious as the ignorance of languages. In addition, the first could be solved if the political strategy for the distribution of ICTs in Cuba were changed. If there were a national policy that promoted social, community, family and individual access to new technologies, with a less instrumental and political vision, they could be used in a more active and innovative way. Therefore, while it is relevant to highlight Cuba's achievements in digital literacy, it is also important to recognize that, as long as ICTs are not overcrowded, the potential skill of the

where the boundaries between eras and educational levels blur" (p. 30).

an internal one due to differences in access between citizens themselves.

**4. Origin and evolution of alternative cultural platforms**

into the country" (Pedro Urra, 2015, personal interview).

One of the main limitations of official media was and is the excessive control exerted by the state's management over it. Gustavo Arcos (2015, personal interview) highlight that this could provoke a certain priority for the transmission of materials with a high political content during audience's preferred periods of relaxation: "Media are excessively controlled by the Ideological Department [of the Communist Party of Cuba], which governs, determines and conditions contents. It has as a consequence that many topics provided by official media do not take into account the needs of the public. That's when alternative businesses thank those responsible for programming, as the public come to them to satisfy their moments of leisure

The "corseted" programming, technical deficiencies, and the lack of adaptation to the needs and tastes of the audience, favored the proliferation of "alternative" platforms. Although "there was a time when the importation of VHS players was prohibited, with a very simple idea based on restricting the entry of this equipment

However, as Pedro Urra continues affirming, "this was a failed attempt to control the use of media linked to the mass consumption of information […]. Parts of the new technologies were massified through the alternative market, because there was no state means of acquiring them. This was due to the absence of a policy for the use

#### *Cultural Studies in Latin America: "Packaged Cuba" DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85920*

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

ments: from media to mediations and from communication to culture.

in the mass media as a support of the "ideology of domination".

formation of identities".

**twenty-first century**

conceptions. For this reason, the previous paradigms were questioned and the communication sciences, which had not managed to solve their methodological and epistemological challenges, began to reverse what they had held to be true. In this context, Jesús Martín-Barbero places "mediation" as one of the central and most systematic analytical categories within his studies. The theoretical proposal of this author opened the way to think about communication from two essential displace-

Martín-Barbero [11] offers a broad conception of communication, which goes far beyond what concerns the media itself to the proposal that mediation becomes an essential category for analysis. This entails studying how culture is negotiated and how it is subject to transactions in a series of contexts, including cinema, popular press, television, radio, circus, musical performances and many others. Martín-Barbero suggests that the syncretic nature of popular practices is of great importance in Latin America. Such practices contribute both to preserve cultural identities and to adapt them to modern demands. Essentially, according to Schlesinger and Morris ([12], p. 8), "interest in mediations is a discourse on the

Some thinkers consider that the contribution of Martín-Barbero [11, 13–15] and García Canclini [16–21] has been fundamental in detecting the importance of the topic of "cultural consumption" at a time when the dominant preoccupation in the studies on culture and communication in Latin America was still the analysis of the messages

**3. Media speech in the digital context of the Revolutionary Cuba of the** 

According to Olivera and Salas [22], the psychological and sociological perspectives of the revolutionary communicative maneuvers self-endorsed through "the mimetic contamination of the Cuban Social Sciences with the Marxist-Leninist theoretical currents arrived from the socialist field" (p. 5). The area of communication was doubly affected, because in the USSR this scientific field was not as developed as other fields. As a consequence of the importation of foreign models, these authors claim that "the autochthonous theoretical development, the critical examination of the different objects of study and the theoretical updating of the researchers was limited, and the existence of a left functionalism was generated" (p. 6); to the point where all scientific fields suffered from too strong a dependence on state guidelines: "The research practices were very permeated by the ideology assumed from the political power and less influenced by an epistemological vision" (p. 7). An affirmation that agrees with the criterion of Linares and Rivero ([23], p. 7): "The state played the role of regulator par excellence in the construction of spaces of equality in all the fundamental areas of life, including recreational—cultural". This is a logic that, to this day in Cuba, continues to develop from more complex tactics and the increase of the new technological devices and the new discursive, relational and structural mediations between journalists, citizens and the government. For Castells [24], we live in a time that is expressed in a new information and communication system of global reach, of convergence of means and languages, and interactive, generated through the expansion of the internet and the new technologies of the information and communication, differentiated from the traditional media in regards to their reticular structure and digitalization. A context in which Canclini [20] especially emphasizes cyberspace as a sphere in which all types of language coexist and which has caused a readjustment in the ways of understanding communication and interpreting the sociocultural practices of the subjects: "This

**176**

contamination between audience behaviors is even more versatile on the Internet, where the boundaries between eras and educational levels blur" (p. 30).

At this point, it is important to clarify that, despite there being cultural policies directed from the state to expand the links between Cuban population, education, culture and revolutionary ideology, "there is no direct and unilateral relationship between institutional efforts and behavior of the subjects" ([20], p. 63). Cuba, like every country with scarce financial resources, is late to most of the technological advances. Hence, the well-known "digital gap", which separates the technological context of the developed world from territories with little monetary capital, has widened in the Island due to the policy of isolation of the revolutionary government itself and the economic embargo imposed on Cuba by the United States. Specifically, there is an external digital gap when compared with other nations, and an internal one due to differences in access between citizens themselves.

However, the relative absence of internet and other ICTs in Cuba does not have a high impact due to the high standard training of citizens in mathematical knowledge and reading and writing. A very important aspect to take into account is that the digital gap should not be measured only in terms of availability of technological resources, but also human resources and, in this sense, the Cuban population does not deviate far from the First World. According to Pedro Urra (2015, personal interview), it is not enough to own the equipment, it must also be known how to make the most of it. The most important issue does not lie in the possession of devices, because this is not as serious as the ignorance of languages. In addition, the first could be solved if the political strategy for the distribution of ICTs in Cuba were changed. If there were a national policy that promoted social, community, family and individual access to new technologies, with a less instrumental and political vision, they could be used in a more active and innovative way. Therefore, while it is relevant to highlight Cuba's achievements in digital literacy, it is also important to recognize that, as long as ICTs are not overcrowded, the potential skill of the population will not be fully manifested.

#### **4. Origin and evolution of alternative cultural platforms**

One of the main limitations of official media was and is the excessive control exerted by the state's management over it. Gustavo Arcos (2015, personal interview) highlight that this could provoke a certain priority for the transmission of materials with a high political content during audience's preferred periods of relaxation: "Media are excessively controlled by the Ideological Department [of the Communist Party of Cuba], which governs, determines and conditions contents. It has as a consequence that many topics provided by official media do not take into account the needs of the public. That's when alternative businesses thank those responsible for programming, as the public come to them to satisfy their moments of leisure and relaxation".

The "corseted" programming, technical deficiencies, and the lack of adaptation to the needs and tastes of the audience, favored the proliferation of "alternative" platforms. Although "there was a time when the importation of VHS players was prohibited, with a very simple idea based on restricting the entry of this equipment into the country" (Pedro Urra, 2015, personal interview).

However, as Pedro Urra continues affirming, "this was a failed attempt to control the use of media linked to the mass consumption of information […]. Parts of the new technologies were massified through the alternative market, because there was no state means of acquiring them. This was due to the absence of a policy for the use of ICTs at the population level".

From the 1990s, with the popularization of Betamax lecto-recording equipment and Video Home System (VHS), the so called "film libraries" (*bancos de películas*) became frequent, where customers went to rent films and some even arranged a system of home delivery. The behavior of this type of consumption was changing depending on the evolution of the technology used to distribute the materials. Even Barrera [25] concludes in his anthropological research, *The revolt of the viewer: an exploratory study on alternative media consumption*, that among the "most obvious" motivations for this type of consumption has been the "technological development".

Barrera [25] points out that

*Cable Television and the Antenna occupied a central place in consumption and were preferred over National Television. In the case of technological supports (DVD/PC/HDD Player), the consumption is greater with respect to the National Television in people without access to the cable or the antenna, when they have audiovisual offers to consume. However, these supports are used to a lesser extent by those with access to the cable or antenna. (p. 76)*

In the first decade of this century, large external storage disks with USB connection reached the IT market. This technology still coexists with the DVD in the Cuban market of informal distribution, however, large hard drives will end up replacing DVDs due to their greater capacity for storing information. The displacement of one technology by another is a gradual and inexorable process, therefore, although in the alternative distribution both forms still coexist, it is a question of time until the most advanced relegate those with less capacity.

#### **4.1 Background to the** *Paquete Semanal*

The alternative consumption of cultural, informative and entertainment products is a phenomenon rooted in Cuban society almost 20 years before the existence of the *Paquete Semanal*. However, Vanessa Márquez, who was in charge of a study conducted by the Social Research Center (CIS) on the *Paquete Semanal*, explains that currently, the most popular distribution support is this one.

"The *Paquete Semanal* has been relegating to the sale of DVDs due to its greater storage capacity, although both audio-visual materials are very similar and contain the same content as 6 or 7 years ago—movies, shows, series, and telenovelas". Similarly, it has largely replaced antennas or cables. As Rodríguez [26], a journalist from Camagüey, in an article written for *BBC Mundo* about informal audiovisual consumption in Cuba, clarifies, nowadays antennas or cables do not constitute the main offer due to the cost and irregularity of access, but because the population is more attracted to the *Paquete Semanal*, which is simpler and cheaper to obtain.

Although the scope of the *Paquete Semanal*, in terms of audience size, does not threaten the supremacy of television as a means of communication par excellence in the Cuban context, the *Paquete Semanal* does constitute a challenge for the main institutions in charge of production and management of all media and audiovisual content on the Island. Therefore, state entities must update their content taking into account the needs of the public and not so much the ideological guidelines imposed by the socialist political system.

A pertinent example of the complexity of the production and distribution system of cultural material and leisure in Cuba was the controversy sparked by the film *Wedding dress* by the Cuban director Marilyn Solaya in 2014, which, after its premiere at the XXXV Festival of New Latin American Cinema, appeared on *YouTube* and in the *Paquete Semanal*, provoking a deep debate among Cuban intellectuals about piracy and copyright. The complexity of this conflict of interests

**179**

*Cultural Studies in Latin America: "Packaged Cuba" DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85920*

out on the matter.

*El Troyano* and *Tico Relly*.

writes for *BBC Mundo* [26]:

*the state.*

**Revolution**

receives certain content and information.

led Cuban film personalities such as Juan Carlos Cremata, Arturo Sotto, Norge Espinoza, Marina Ochoa, Gustavo Arcos and Juan Antonio García Borrero to speak

The great unknown about this product is its realization. With the aforementioned technological limitations, the ways used to download a Terabyte of information every week are a mystery: "How can hundreds of gigabytes of video information be obtained, often within a few hours of the original transmission?" Asks Dean Luis Reyes [28] in his article *Phenomenology of the Paquete*, since most of

The variety and quantity of materials is not the only outstanding feature, Vladia Rubio [29], on the *CubaSí* website, refers to its possible instructive quality and to the news content it has: "It contains materials for entertainment, but also many

In the press, the *Paquete Semanal* is generally characterized as a compendium of audiovisuals, media, computer applications, documents and advertising. The main qualities highlighted are the amount of materials it has and its effectiveness at distributing it throughout the country. Alejandro Rodríguez, Camagüey journalist,

*The Paquete has existed for about five years in the Cuban socio-cultural life and thanks to it one has access—with a week's delay, to that which foreign television stations transmit, along with contents downloaded from the Internet, including commercial advertising, something not seen on national television, all controlled by* 

**4.2** *Paquete Semanal* **and its implications for the socialist ideology of the Cuban** 

official *nor alternative; that is clear*. However, with a capacity of one terabyte, it offers a content comprising different types of materials ranging from those of North American, Mexican, Spanish, Korean origin, to award-winning films. It also has sections of humorous videos, shows, newscasts, documentaries, music, cooking shows, literature, magazines, updates for antivirus, applications for android systems, among many other choices. Something that makes it a "format" to be taken into account when analyzing the "medium" through which the Cuban population

We need to specify exactly what the *Paquete Semanal* is. It is not a media, neither

the accounts of Internet in Cuba suggest a very low download speed.

others whose essential purpose is to instruct, inform, update".

The *Paquete Semanal* is defined by journalists as an audiovisual conglomerate, while applications and writings are seen as useful complements of the main material that is composed of series, films, soap operas, drama, talent shows, reality shows, video clips, animations, documentaries, sports and news videos. The journalist Fernando Ravsberg [27], in his article, The *Cuban Youtube*, agrees with the above and also details his particular hypothesis about the creation of the *Paquete*. For Ravsberg, this product dates back to 2008 and its inventor is the man who made himself known through the YoePC58 brand, who has not been in business since 2013. Reyes [28] reaffirms the mechanisms for sending it to the provinces through state transportation: "During the first decade of the twenty-first century, in Cuba there was the curious phenomenon of the appearance of wholesale distributors of audiovisual content, who provided the variety and sufficient quantity of material to sustain the consumers' avidity. Many of them even establish themselves in stamps or recognizable brands". Some of those brands made known through the *Paquete* are: *YoePC, SamuelPro, ShowPlus, Abdel la Escencia, Elio eL Transporta2r, AlePromo,* 

*Cultural Studies in Latin America: "Packaged Cuba" DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85920*

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

Barrera [25] points out that

*those with access to the cable or antenna. (p. 76)*

time until the most advanced relegate those with less capacity.

that currently, the most popular distribution support is this one.

**4.1 Background to the** *Paquete Semanal*

by the socialist political system.

From the 1990s, with the popularization of Betamax lecto-recording equipment and Video Home System (VHS), the so called "film libraries" (*bancos de películas*) became frequent, where customers went to rent films and some even arranged a system of home delivery. The behavior of this type of consumption was changing depending on the evolution of the technology used to distribute the materials. Even Barrera [25] concludes in his anthropological research, *The revolt of the viewer: an exploratory study on alternative media consumption*, that among the "most obvious" motivations for this type of consumption has been the "technological development".

*Cable Television and the Antenna occupied a central place in consumption and were preferred over National Television. In the case of technological supports (DVD/PC/HDD Player), the consumption is greater with respect to the National Television in people without access to the cable or the antenna, when they have audiovisual offers to consume. However, these supports are used to a lesser extent by* 

In the first decade of this century, large external storage disks with USB connection reached the IT market. This technology still coexists with the DVD in the Cuban market of informal distribution, however, large hard drives will end up replacing DVDs due to their greater capacity for storing information. The displacement of one technology by another is a gradual and inexorable process, therefore, although in the alternative distribution both forms still coexist, it is a question of

The alternative consumption of cultural, informative and entertainment products is a phenomenon rooted in Cuban society almost 20 years before the existence of the *Paquete Semanal*. However, Vanessa Márquez, who was in charge of a study conducted by the Social Research Center (CIS) on the *Paquete Semanal*, explains

"The *Paquete Semanal* has been relegating to the sale of DVDs due to its greater storage capacity, although both audio-visual materials are very similar and contain the same content as 6 or 7 years ago—movies, shows, series, and telenovelas". Similarly, it has largely replaced antennas or cables. As Rodríguez [26], a journalist from Camagüey, in an article written for *BBC Mundo* about informal audiovisual consumption in Cuba, clarifies, nowadays antennas or cables do not constitute the main offer due to the cost and irregularity of access, but because the population is more attracted to the *Paquete Semanal*, which is simpler and cheaper to obtain. Although the scope of the *Paquete Semanal*, in terms of audience size, does not threaten the supremacy of television as a means of communication par excellence in the Cuban context, the *Paquete Semanal* does constitute a challenge for the main institutions in charge of production and management of all media and audiovisual content on the Island. Therefore, state entities must update their content taking into account the needs of the public and not so much the ideological guidelines imposed

A pertinent example of the complexity of the production and distribution system of cultural material and leisure in Cuba was the controversy sparked by the film *Wedding dress* by the Cuban director Marilyn Solaya in 2014, which, after its premiere at the XXXV Festival of New Latin American Cinema, appeared on *YouTube* and in the *Paquete Semanal*, provoking a deep debate among Cuban intellectuals about piracy and copyright. The complexity of this conflict of interests

**178**

led Cuban film personalities such as Juan Carlos Cremata, Arturo Sotto, Norge Espinoza, Marina Ochoa, Gustavo Arcos and Juan Antonio García Borrero to speak out on the matter.

The *Paquete Semanal* is defined by journalists as an audiovisual conglomerate, while applications and writings are seen as useful complements of the main material that is composed of series, films, soap operas, drama, talent shows, reality shows, video clips, animations, documentaries, sports and news videos. The journalist Fernando Ravsberg [27], in his article, The *Cuban Youtube*, agrees with the above and also details his particular hypothesis about the creation of the *Paquete*. For Ravsberg, this product dates back to 2008 and its inventor is the man who made himself known through the YoePC58 brand, who has not been in business since 2013. Reyes [28] reaffirms the mechanisms for sending it to the provinces through state transportation: "During the first decade of the twenty-first century, in Cuba there was the curious phenomenon of the appearance of wholesale distributors of audiovisual content, who provided the variety and sufficient quantity of material to sustain the consumers' avidity. Many of them even establish themselves in stamps or recognizable brands". Some of those brands made known through the *Paquete* are: *YoePC, SamuelPro, ShowPlus, Abdel la Escencia, Elio eL Transporta2r, AlePromo, El Troyano* and *Tico Relly*.

The great unknown about this product is its realization. With the aforementioned technological limitations, the ways used to download a Terabyte of information every week are a mystery: "How can hundreds of gigabytes of video information be obtained, often within a few hours of the original transmission?" Asks Dean Luis Reyes [28] in his article *Phenomenology of the Paquete*, since most of the accounts of Internet in Cuba suggest a very low download speed.

The variety and quantity of materials is not the only outstanding feature, Vladia Rubio [29], on the *CubaSí* website, refers to its possible instructive quality and to the news content it has: "It contains materials for entertainment, but also many others whose essential purpose is to instruct, inform, update".

In the press, the *Paquete Semanal* is generally characterized as a compendium of audiovisuals, media, computer applications, documents and advertising. The main qualities highlighted are the amount of materials it has and its effectiveness at distributing it throughout the country. Alejandro Rodríguez, Camagüey journalist, writes for *BBC Mundo* [26]:

*The Paquete has existed for about five years in the Cuban socio-cultural life and thanks to it one has access—with a week's delay, to that which foreign television stations transmit, along with contents downloaded from the Internet, including commercial advertising, something not seen on national television, all controlled by the state.*

#### **4.2** *Paquete Semanal* **and its implications for the socialist ideology of the Cuban Revolution**

We need to specify exactly what the *Paquete Semanal* is. It is not a media, neither official *nor alternative; that is clear*. However, with a capacity of one terabyte, it offers a content comprising different types of materials ranging from those of North American, Mexican, Spanish, Korean origin, to award-winning films. It also has sections of humorous videos, shows, newscasts, documentaries, music, cooking shows, literature, magazines, updates for antivirus, applications for android systems, among many other choices. Something that makes it a "format" to be taken into account when analyzing the "medium" through which the Cuban population receives certain content and information.

So wide has been the scope of this product in Cuba in recent years, which, according to the Doctor of Communication Sciences and vice president of the Union of Journalists of Cuba (UPEC), Rosa Miriam Elizarde (2015, personal interview), has come to establish patterns in the consumption model of the Island that could determine the interaction with broadband internet: "Cultural consumption on that platform is marked and has to deal with the forms, tastes and interests of consumption that conform with the *Paquete Semanal,* as a framework of negotiations and remaining of the visions and representations of the subjects in the current Cuba". For this reason, the most important thing is to put products on the market that reach the entire population and adapt to their needs and desires. More so at a time when, although the political system covers all spheres of life in the country, it is losing the ability to organize and control the use of free time by citizens.

This is a readjustment aimed at adjusting the territorial inequalities based on the distribution of natural resources, the strategic importance of the space, and the political-administrative decisions of the state [5].3

According to a study carried out in 2015 by the Social Research Center of the Radio and Television Institute (CIS) [31], the *Paquete Semanal* is consumed by at least 40% of the population of Havana. Furthermore, as Vanessa Márquez (2015, personal interview), one of the directors of this research, explains, this figure is very conservative, because due to the pseudo-legal nature of this product, some people surveyed hid their consumption. Even so, its high social penetration indicates the popularity of the *Paquete Semanal*, being currently a key product within the Cuban audiovisual and information Consumption, to such an extent that the film and television critic, Víctor Fowler4 defines it as "one of the main Cuban cultural phenomena of this century" and the renowned filmmaker, Rebeca Chávez [32], states: "Cuba's programming is the *Paquete*".

The relevance achieved by the *Paquete Semanal* is also seen in the increase in articles devoted to its composition and analysis in the national and international press, some of them published in important media such as *Granma*, the official organ of the Communist Party (PCC), the Information System of *Televisión Cubana*, and the well-known *British BBC* chain, among many others. Important personalities of culture, such as the advisor of the Council of state, Abel Prieto (2015, personal interview), have directly referred to the consumption of this product. In addition, the issue has been addressed at events such as the VIII Congress of the Union of Artists and Writers of Cuba and in debates organized with intellectuals and officials to expressly address this phenomenon.

On this lack and the absence of works on the consolidation of this "informal system", which are transparent, rigorous and with impact on the spheres of power, the critic and researcher Juan Antonio García Borrero [33] delves deeper:

*Studies on cultural consumption in contemporary Cuba have yet to finalize a long agenda. […] We would lack a solid basis for discussion, from which concrete strategies can be proposed by our cultural institutions in this era where informal consumption is simply redesigning the leisure maps in a radical way.*

Due to the importance of this product, it is pertinent to carry out studies that characterize the informal consumption of contents included in the *Paquete Semanal*, its consumption practices, its management and distribution and its relationship with the growing de-ideologization of socialist ideals among Cuban youth. The foreign contents offered in the *Paquete* are composed, mainly, of American,

**181**

different perspectives.

Ravsberg and Omar Olazábal.

There have been institutional pronouncements".

*Cultural Studies in Latin America: "Packaged Cuba" DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85920*

them. In this regard, Borrero [33] considers:

Spanish, Mexican and Colombian productions, which sometimes transmit messages and values different from those that the socialist model of the Cuban Revolution tries to inculcate in the citizens of the country. Globalization and economic power have made the North American audiovisual industry "colonize" a considerable part of the planet, extending and imposing its ideology. In Hollywood, only 5% of the world's cinema is produced, however, more than 50% of the profits are generated [34]. Cuba is not exempt from this cultural hegemony, from that possession of the symbolism that Max Webber described as "charismatic authority". As they do not have the economic and technological resources to face it, it is crucial to address the use that young people give to these cultural assets and their ways of appropriating

*I will be told that the Paquete Semanal is guaranteeing among its contents that diversity to which any individual could aspire. There are quotas of truth there, but also mirages that make us forget that the cultural hegemony in these times operates with a deceptive freedom to choose. The Cubans of today have almost everything that is seen in the First World television and movie theaters, and it is precisely that indisputable detail that could activate the button of suspicion. The representation of the others worlds where would it be? Would not the Paquete be a jail with infinite paths that bifurcate to always arrive at the same image-emitting center?*

One thing is certain, the *Paquete* and the rest of tools and technological platforms are consumed for a large part of the social groups is intensely linked with the different artistic, cultural and ideological fields, constituting "the main sources of

The *Paquete Semanal* has been a topic frequently addressed in national and international media. The Information System of Cuban Television, the program *La mesa redonda* (The Round Table), *Granma*—the official body of the Communist Party of Cuba, *Juventud Rebelde*—the Union of Young Communists, *BBC Mundo*, *Radio Reloj*, the cultural magazines *Cayman Barbudo*, *Temas*, *La Jiribilla* and *La Gaceta*, as well as the websites: *CubaSí*, *Cubadebate*, *OnCuba Magazine*, *Cuba Contemporánea*, *Progreso Semanal* and *IPS Cuba* have examined this topic from

Intellectuals, directors of cultural institutions and researchers have publicly referred to this phenomenon, either through congresses, debates or press articles. A number stand out among these: Abel Prieto, Rafael Hernandez, Rebeca Chávez, Juan Antonio García Borrero, Cecilia Linares, Gustavo Arcos, Milena Recio, Mario Masvidal, Rolando Pérez Betancourt, Víctor Fowler, Dean Luis Reyes, Fernando

Above all, after the issue was addressed during April 2014, at the VIII Congress of the UNEAC, where the then advisor to the Council of state and former Minister of Culture, Abel Prieto (in *OnCuba*, 2014) referred to the *Paquete* as a result of "errors of our educational, cultural and media institutions". The editor-in-chief of the magazine *OnCuba*, Milena Recio, describes the boom of information published with respect to this product after the Congress: "in May of this year (2014) the *Paquete Semanal* was spoken of in a low voice, in daily life, but It was not publicized in the usual press circuits. Today, the *Paquete* has already been talked about a lot.

One of the main evidences of Cuba's packaging is mentioned by the researcher

and professor at the University of Havana, Laura Domínguez (2015, personal

information and entertainment" in Cuba ([33], pp. 46 and 47).

**4.3 Is the Paquete Semanal the archetype of the "packaged Cuba"?**

<sup>3</sup> Based on the theory of the Brazilian researcher Santos [30] regarding "the opaque and luminous zones".

<sup>4</sup> Dissertation in Competition Ania Pino in Memoriam (November 8, 2014).

*Cultural Studies in Latin America: "Packaged Cuba" DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85920*

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

So wide has been the scope of this product in Cuba in recent years, which, according to the Doctor of Communication Sciences and vice president of the Union of Journalists of Cuba (UPEC), Rosa Miriam Elizarde (2015, personal interview), has come to establish patterns in the consumption model of the Island that could determine the interaction with broadband internet: "Cultural consumption on that platform is marked and has to deal with the forms, tastes and interests of consumption that conform with the *Paquete Semanal,* as a framework of negotiations and remaining of the visions and representations of the subjects in the current Cuba". For this reason, the most important thing is to put products on the market that reach the entire population and adapt to their needs and desires. More so at a time when, although the political system covers all spheres of life in the country, it

is losing the ability to organize and control the use of free time by citizens.

political-administrative decisions of the state [5].3

film and television critic, Víctor Fowler4

to expressly address this phenomenon.

[32], states: "Cuba's programming is the *Paquete*".

This is a readjustment aimed at adjusting the territorial inequalities based on the distribution of natural resources, the strategic importance of the space, and the

According to a study carried out in 2015 by the Social Research Center of the Radio and Television Institute (CIS) [31], the *Paquete Semanal* is consumed by at least 40% of the population of Havana. Furthermore, as Vanessa Márquez (2015, personal interview), one of the directors of this research, explains, this figure is very conservative, because due to the pseudo-legal nature of this product, some people surveyed hid their consumption. Even so, its high social penetration indicates the popularity of the *Paquete Semanal*, being currently a key product within the Cuban audiovisual and information Consumption, to such an extent that the

cultural phenomena of this century" and the renowned filmmaker, Rebeca Chávez

The relevance achieved by the *Paquete Semanal* is also seen in the increase in articles devoted to its composition and analysis in the national and international press, some of them published in important media such as *Granma*, the official organ of the Communist Party (PCC), the Information System of *Televisión Cubana*, and the well-known *British BBC* chain, among many others. Important personalities of culture, such as the advisor of the Council of state, Abel Prieto (2015, personal interview), have directly referred to the consumption of this product. In addition, the issue has been addressed at events such as the VIII Congress of the Union of Artists and Writers of Cuba and in debates organized with intellectuals and officials

On this lack and the absence of works on the consolidation of this "informal system", which are transparent, rigorous and with impact on the spheres of power,

*Studies on cultural consumption in contemporary Cuba have yet to finalize a long agenda. […] We would lack a solid basis for discussion, from which concrete strategies can be proposed by our cultural institutions in this era where informal* 

Due to the importance of this product, it is pertinent to carry out studies that characterize the informal consumption of contents included in the *Paquete Semanal*,

<sup>3</sup> Based on the theory of the Brazilian researcher Santos [30] regarding "the opaque and luminous zones".

the critic and researcher Juan Antonio García Borrero [33] delves deeper:

*consumption is simply redesigning the leisure maps in a radical way.*

<sup>4</sup> Dissertation in Competition Ania Pino in Memoriam (November 8, 2014).

its consumption practices, its management and distribution and its relationship with the growing de-ideologization of socialist ideals among Cuban youth. The foreign contents offered in the *Paquete* are composed, mainly, of American,

defines it as "one of the main Cuban

**180**

Spanish, Mexican and Colombian productions, which sometimes transmit messages and values different from those that the socialist model of the Cuban Revolution tries to inculcate in the citizens of the country. Globalization and economic power have made the North American audiovisual industry "colonize" a considerable part of the planet, extending and imposing its ideology. In Hollywood, only 5% of the world's cinema is produced, however, more than 50% of the profits are generated [34]. Cuba is not exempt from this cultural hegemony, from that possession of the symbolism that Max Webber described as "charismatic authority". As they do not have the economic and technological resources to face it, it is crucial to address the use that young people give to these cultural assets and their ways of appropriating them. In this regard, Borrero [33] considers:

*I will be told that the Paquete Semanal is guaranteeing among its contents that diversity to which any individual could aspire. There are quotas of truth there, but also mirages that make us forget that the cultural hegemony in these times operates with a deceptive freedom to choose. The Cubans of today have almost everything that is seen in the First World television and movie theaters, and it is precisely that indisputable detail that could activate the button of suspicion. The representation of the others worlds where would it be? Would not the Paquete be a jail with infinite paths that bifurcate to always arrive at the same image-emitting center?*

One thing is certain, the *Paquete* and the rest of tools and technological platforms are consumed for a large part of the social groups is intensely linked with the different artistic, cultural and ideological fields, constituting "the main sources of information and entertainment" in Cuba ([33], pp. 46 and 47).

#### **4.3 Is the Paquete Semanal the archetype of the "packaged Cuba"?**

The *Paquete Semanal* has been a topic frequently addressed in national and international media. The Information System of Cuban Television, the program *La mesa redonda* (The Round Table), *Granma*—the official body of the Communist Party of Cuba, *Juventud Rebelde*—the Union of Young Communists, *BBC Mundo*, *Radio Reloj*, the cultural magazines *Cayman Barbudo*, *Temas*, *La Jiribilla* and *La Gaceta*, as well as the websites: *CubaSí*, *Cubadebate*, *OnCuba Magazine*, *Cuba Contemporánea*, *Progreso Semanal* and *IPS Cuba* have examined this topic from different perspectives.

Intellectuals, directors of cultural institutions and researchers have publicly referred to this phenomenon, either through congresses, debates or press articles. A number stand out among these: Abel Prieto, Rafael Hernandez, Rebeca Chávez, Juan Antonio García Borrero, Cecilia Linares, Gustavo Arcos, Milena Recio, Mario Masvidal, Rolando Pérez Betancourt, Víctor Fowler, Dean Luis Reyes, Fernando Ravsberg and Omar Olazábal.

Above all, after the issue was addressed during April 2014, at the VIII Congress of the UNEAC, where the then advisor to the Council of state and former Minister of Culture, Abel Prieto (in *OnCuba*, 2014) referred to the *Paquete* as a result of "errors of our educational, cultural and media institutions". The editor-in-chief of the magazine *OnCuba*, Milena Recio, describes the boom of information published with respect to this product after the Congress: "in May of this year (2014) the *Paquete Semanal* was spoken of in a low voice, in daily life, but It was not publicized in the usual press circuits. Today, the *Paquete* has already been talked about a lot. There have been institutional pronouncements".

One of the main evidences of Cuba's packaging is mentioned by the researcher and professor at the University of Havana, Laura Domínguez (2015, personal

interview), who considers that the state offering is incapable of equaling the private one: "If we analyze Cuban TV, I do not think it is up to competing with the *Paquete*. In Cuba it is very difficult to create a cultural option that exceeds the *Paquete*. Proof of this is that more than half of surveyed consumers of the *Paquete* do not mention anything negative in regard to this product".

#### **5. Conclusions**

The proposal of this chapter as a contribution to the cultural studies in Latin America is part of the idea that the decolonial turn in this region arises from the need of "changing the way of changing", which entails an "epistemic declassification" (*desclasamiento epistémico*) [35] based on "the need to abandon all pretensions of universality and truth" (p. 49) from northern hemisphere countries. This reconceptualization of the (des)colonial matrix implies, according to Mignolo [36], the management and control of subjectivities (media consumption, contents of the digital native platforms, education, among other); the management and the control of authority; the management and control of the economy; and, the management and control of knowledge. Areas to which a fifth could be added, the management of "nature, land and territory" (pp. 45–46).

Hence in Cuba, media, both official and private, and the academy [37–39] recognize the great ideological influence and the extent of consumption of the *Paquete Semanal* in society and its impact on current cultural and informative processes due to its influence of the habits of a large section of the population, impossible to quantify due to the "unofficial" status of the *Paquete* and its informal means of distribution. The noteworthy thing about this context is that in a country with a socialist system, which keeps private property limited to some non-strategic sectors for the government, a private product emerges, controlled by a group of people who, according to themselves, prioritize the contents that sell best and work outside the cultural policies of the state, and which manages to establish itself as a private monopoly of content distribution through informal channels, which in recent years have become almost as important as official modes. A position that attacks directly the conservation of the socialist ideological foundations posed by the Cuban government.

This is a disjunctive that affects the country and citizens in general, but that directly concerns the group of journalists on the Island. The main friction between alternative platforms of cultural contents, like the *Paquete Semanal*, and Cuban journalists, as legitimate constituent members of the current media panorama of Cuba, is the lacking legal recognition of these new communicative actors, related to the production and distribution of informative contents outside the apparatus of official media. The *Paquete Semanal*, specifically, exists in a climate of a-legality and diffuse property regime, without rigid operating structures, which has enabled it to adapt more efficiently to changes within the Cuban media ecosystem.

Similarly, the official media and journalists working on them are aware of their inability to face the information and entertainment offer of these alternative platforms that have the *Paquete Semanal* as their main exponent. As [34] points out, many other countries with great economic power cannot cope with the American production of series and films.

It is a challenge for the new government, official institution and media, and journalists due to the diverse, dynamic and complex nature of this phenomenon; for the encompassing, deregulated and changing of this type of cultural practices, which include multiple social, economic, legal and, above all, political processes. Even more so in a country where the socialist values of the revolution, infused into society, have been based on collective and communal needs.

**183**

*Cultural Studies in Latin America: "Packaged Cuba" DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85920*

configuration of their leisure time.

have caused.

**Author details**

Martín Oller Alonso1

1 University of Havana, Havana, Cuba

provided the original work is properly cited.

2 Cubadebate, Havana, Cuba

The current reality is that the social uses of the contents of the *Paquete Semanal* are generated from a compendium of materials that nowadays, due to its novelty and wide diffusion, is at the center of the phenomenon of the consumption of informal content and appropriation of individual and collective values far from the socialist paradigms and ideals. Content formed by information from magazines, literature, series, movies, soap operas, reality shows, sports, musicals, media, documentaries and, almost anything you can imagine. For this reasons, the *Paquete Semanal* is considered as a modeler of daily social practices, and, for the young consumers, this compendium of digital content constitutes a core element in the

The consumption of the *Paquete Semanal* has important implications for the formation of values and identity—both individual and generational—of Cuban people. The new generations prefer to interact with this alternative rather than the traditional media, because the *Paquete Semanal* offers a greater abundance of cultural options and more facilities for the choice of spend time. The rising prominence of informal content consumption in Cuban society, beyond the official media, constitutes a challenge for the decision makers of the country's public policies, especially those associated with the communication and culture sectors. These policies must be updated to reconfigure the cultural consumption that the unofficial alternatives

\* and José Raúl Concepción Llanes2

© 2020 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,

\*Address all correspondence to: martin.olleralonso@gmail.com

*Cultural Studies in Latin America: "Packaged Cuba" DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85920*

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

anything negative in regard to this product".

of "nature, land and territory" (pp. 45–46).

**5. Conclusions**

interview), who considers that the state offering is incapable of equaling the private one: "If we analyze Cuban TV, I do not think it is up to competing with the *Paquete*. In Cuba it is very difficult to create a cultural option that exceeds the *Paquete*. Proof of this is that more than half of surveyed consumers of the *Paquete* do not mention

The proposal of this chapter as a contribution to the cultural studies in Latin America is part of the idea that the decolonial turn in this region arises from the need of "changing the way of changing", which entails an "epistemic declassification" (*desclasamiento epistémico*) [35] based on "the need to abandon all pretensions of universality and truth" (p. 49) from northern hemisphere countries. This reconceptualization of the (des)colonial matrix implies, according to Mignolo [36], the management and control of subjectivities (media consumption, contents of the digital native platforms, education, among other); the management and the control of authority; the management and control of the economy; and, the management and control of knowledge. Areas to which a fifth could be added, the management

Hence in Cuba, media, both official and private, and the academy [37–39] recognize the great ideological influence and the extent of consumption of the *Paquete Semanal* in society and its impact on current cultural and informative processes due to its influence of the habits of a large section of the population, impossible to quantify due to the "unofficial" status of the *Paquete* and its informal means of distribution. The noteworthy thing about this context is that in a country with a socialist system, which keeps private property limited to some non-strategic sectors for the government, a private product emerges, controlled by a group of people who, according to themselves, prioritize the contents that sell best and work outside the cultural policies of the state, and which manages to establish itself as a private monopoly of content distribution through informal channels, which in recent years have become almost as important as official modes. A position that attacks directly the conservation of the socialist ideological foundations posed by the Cuban government. This is a disjunctive that affects the country and citizens in general, but that directly concerns the group of journalists on the Island. The main friction between alternative platforms of cultural contents, like the *Paquete Semanal*, and Cuban journalists, as legitimate constituent members of the current media panorama of Cuba, is the lacking legal recognition of these new communicative actors, related to the production and distribution of informative contents outside the apparatus of official media. The *Paquete Semanal*, specifically, exists in a climate of a-legality and diffuse property regime, without rigid operating structures, which has enabled it to

adapt more efficiently to changes within the Cuban media ecosystem.

society, have been based on collective and communal needs.

Similarly, the official media and journalists working on them are aware of their inability to face the information and entertainment offer of these alternative platforms that have the *Paquete Semanal* as their main exponent. As [34] points out, many other countries with great economic power cannot cope with the American

It is a challenge for the new government, official institution and media, and journalists due to the diverse, dynamic and complex nature of this phenomenon; for the encompassing, deregulated and changing of this type of cultural practices, which include multiple social, economic, legal and, above all, political processes. Even more so in a country where the socialist values of the revolution, infused into

**182**

production of series and films.

The current reality is that the social uses of the contents of the *Paquete Semanal* are generated from a compendium of materials that nowadays, due to its novelty and wide diffusion, is at the center of the phenomenon of the consumption of informal content and appropriation of individual and collective values far from the socialist paradigms and ideals. Content formed by information from magazines, literature, series, movies, soap operas, reality shows, sports, musicals, media, documentaries and, almost anything you can imagine. For this reasons, the *Paquete Semanal* is considered as a modeler of daily social practices, and, for the young consumers, this compendium of digital content constitutes a core element in the configuration of their leisure time.

The consumption of the *Paquete Semanal* has important implications for the formation of values and identity—both individual and generational—of Cuban people. The new generations prefer to interact with this alternative rather than the traditional media, because the *Paquete Semanal* offers a greater abundance of cultural options and more facilities for the choice of spend time. The rising prominence of informal content consumption in Cuban society, beyond the official media, constitutes a challenge for the decision makers of the country's public policies, especially those associated with the communication and culture sectors. These policies must be updated to reconfigure the cultural consumption that the unofficial alternatives have caused.

#### **Author details**

Martín Oller Alonso1 \* and José Raúl Concepción Llanes2

#### 1 University of Havana, Havana, Cuba

2 Cubadebate, Havana, Cuba

\*Address all correspondence to: martin.olleralonso@gmail.com

© 2020 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

### **References**

[1] Castells M. La era de la información. Vol. 1. La sociedad red. Spain: Alianza; 2000

[2] Petras J. Cultural imperialism in the late 20th century. Journal of Contemporary Asia. 1993;**23**:139-148

[3] Hodder I. Theoretical archaeology: A reactionary view. In: Hodder I, editor. Symbolic and Structural. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press; 1985. pp. 1-16

[4] Stephens NP. Towards a more substantive media ecology: Postman's metaphor versus posthuman futures. International Journal of Communication. 2014;**8**:2027-2045

[5] Íñiguez L. Heterogeneidad social en Cuba. Entre herencias y renovaciones. In: Collective authors, editor. Miradas a la economía cubana II. Havana: Caminos; 2010. pp. 117-140

[6] Lindahl H. Fault Lines of Globalization: Legal Order and the Politics of A-Legality. 2013

[7] Mattelart A, Neuveu E. Introducción a los estudios culturales. México, DF: Paidós; 2004

[8] Reguillo R. Los estudios culturales. Portal de la Comunicación: El mapa incómodo de un relato inconcluso; 2004 Available from: http://www. portalcomunicacio.com/download/16. pdf

[9] Gámez N. El giro cultural en los estudios de Comunicación; críticas y perspectivas [Master's thesis]. Havana: University of Havana; 2006

[10] Mattelart A. Networking the World, 1794-2000. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press; 2000

[11] De Martín-Barbero J. los medios a las mediaciones. Comunicación, cultura y

hegemonía. Ed. Gustavo Gili: Barcelona; 1987

[12] Schlesinger P, Morris N. Fronteras culturales: Identidad y Comunicación en América Latina. Estudios Sobre las Culturas Contemporáneas. 1997;**III**(2):49-85

[13] Martín-Barbero J. Recepción: Uso de medios y consumo cultural. Diálogos de la Comunicación. 1991;**30**:4-5

[14] Martín-Barbero J. Globalización y multiculturalidad: notas para una agenda de investigación. In: López de la Roche F, editor. Globalización: incertidumbre y posibilidades. Bogotá. Tercer Mundo; 1999. pp. 95-122

[15] Martín-Barbero J. Medios, mediaciones y tecnologías. Signo y Pensamiento. 2002;**21**(41):13-20

[16] García Canclini N. Las culturas populares en el capitalismo. Ediciones Casa de las Américas: Havana; 1982

[17] García Canclini N. El consumo sirve para pensar. Diálogos de la comunicación. 1991;**30**:6-9

[18] García Canclini N. Los estudios sobre comunicación y consumo: el trabajo interdisciplinario en tiempos neoconservadores. Diálogos de la Comunicación. 1992:1-9

[19] García Canclini N. La globalización imaginada. Paidós: Barcelona; 1999

[20] García Canclini N. Culturas híbridas. Estrategias para entrar y salir de la modernidad. Paidós: Buenos Aires; 2001

[21] García Canclini N. El mundo como un lugar extraño. Buenos Aires: Editorial Gedisa; 2014

[22] Olivera D, Salas J. La investigación en comunicación en Cuba: una mirada

**185**

*Cultural Studies in Latin America: "Packaged Cuba" DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85920*

> [30] Santos M. Los espacios de la globalización. Anales de Geografía de la Universidad Complutense.

[31] Centro de Investigaciones Sociales del Instituto Cubano de Radio y Televisión. Informe Final sobre Consumo Alternativo de Medios Audiovisuales en la capital. Havana:

[32] Chávez R. Otra vez la realidad y "Conducta". Cubadebate. 2014 Available from: http://www.cubadebate.cu/ opinion/2014/11/20/otra-vez-larealidad-y-conducta/#.W-890eK23IU

[33] García Borrero JA. Provocaciones en torno al consumo cultural en Cuba. La Jiribilla. No. 704. 2014. Available from: http://www.epoca2.lajiribilla.cu/ articulo/9092/provocaciones-en-torno-

[34] Ramonet I. Propagandas Silenciosas. Masas, Televisión, Cine. La Habana:

al-consumo-cultural-en-cuba

Ediciones Especiales; 2002

Jorge Alonso; 2017. pp. 43-60

CIDOB and UACI; 2015

[37] Concepción JR. La cultura empaquetada. Análisis del consumo audiovisual informal del Paquete Semanal en un grupo de jóvenes capitalinos [Degree thesis]. Havana:

University of Havana; 2015

[38] García W. Para disfrutar en familia Acercamiento al consumo audiovisual en familia del paquete semanal en redes

[36] Mignolo WD. Habitar la frontera. Sentir y Pensar la Descolonialidad (Antología, 1999-2004). Barcelona:

[35] Escobar A. Desde abajo, por la izquierda y con la tierra: La diferencia de Abya Yala/Afro/Latino/América. In: Regalado J, editor. Pensamiento Crítico, Cosmovisiones y Epistemologías Otras, Para Enfrentar la Guerra Capitalista y Construer Autonomía. México: Cátedra

1993;**13**:69-77

Fondos del CIS; 2015

al pasado para pensar el futuro. In: XIII Encuentro Latinoamericano de Facultades de Comunicación Social; 22 October. Havana: University of Havana;

[23] Linares C, Rivero Y. El consumo cultural en Cuba. Trayectoria en su conceptualización y análisis. Revista

[24] Castells M. La cultura de la virtualidad real: la integración de la comunicación electrónica, el fin de la audiencia de masas y el desarrollo de las redes interactivas en la era de la información. Mexico, DF: Siglo

[25] Barrera Y. La revuelta del

[26] Rodríguez A. Cómo hacen los cubanos para tener acceso a la TV internacional. In: BBC Mundo. 2014. Available from: http://www.bbc.co.uk/ mundo/blogs/2014/10/141009\_voces\_ desde\_cuba\_ale jandro\_rodriguez\_

[27] El Ravsberg F. YouTube cubano. OnCuba Magazine. 2014 Available from: http://oncubamagazine.com/a-fondo/

[28] Reyes DL. Fenomenología del paquete. IPS Cuba. 2014 Available

[29] Rubio V. El "paquete": la insensatez del vegetariano. In: Cuba Sí. 2014. Available from: http://www.cubasi. cu/index.php?option%3Dcom\_k2% 26vie%3Ditem%26id%3D31829:el %25E2%2580%259Cpaquete%25E 2%2580%259D-la-insensatez-delvegetariano%26Itemid%3D17

from: http://www.ipscuba. net/?option=com\_k2&view=item &id=10465:fenomenolog%C3% ADa-del-paquete-parteii&Itemid=11

paquete\_semanal.shtml

el-youtube-cubano/

espectador: estudio exploratorio sobre el consumo mediático alternative [Master's Thesis]. Havana: University of Havana;

2009. p. 2014

Perfiles. 2008:1

Veintiuno; 1999

2009

*Cultural Studies in Latin America: "Packaged Cuba" DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.85920*

al pasado para pensar el futuro. In: XIII Encuentro Latinoamericano de Facultades de Comunicación Social; 22 October. Havana: University of Havana; 2009. p. 2014

[23] Linares C, Rivero Y. El consumo cultural en Cuba. Trayectoria en su conceptualización y análisis. Revista Perfiles. 2008:1

[24] Castells M. La cultura de la virtualidad real: la integración de la comunicación electrónica, el fin de la audiencia de masas y el desarrollo de las redes interactivas en la era de la información. Mexico, DF: Siglo Veintiuno; 1999

[25] Barrera Y. La revuelta del espectador: estudio exploratorio sobre el consumo mediático alternative [Master's Thesis]. Havana: University of Havana; 2009

[26] Rodríguez A. Cómo hacen los cubanos para tener acceso a la TV internacional. In: BBC Mundo. 2014. Available from: http://www.bbc.co.uk/ mundo/blogs/2014/10/141009\_voces\_ desde\_cuba\_ale jandro\_rodriguez\_ paquete\_semanal.shtml

[27] El Ravsberg F. YouTube cubano. OnCuba Magazine. 2014 Available from: http://oncubamagazine.com/a-fondo/ el-youtube-cubano/

[28] Reyes DL. Fenomenología del paquete. IPS Cuba. 2014 Available from: http://www.ipscuba. net/?option=com\_k2&view=item &id=10465:fenomenolog%C3% ADa-del-paquete-parteii&Itemid=11

[29] Rubio V. El "paquete": la insensatez del vegetariano. In: Cuba Sí. 2014. Available from: http://www.cubasi. cu/index.php?option%3Dcom\_k2% 26vie%3Ditem%26id%3D31829:el %25E2%2580%259Cpaquete%25E 2%2580%259D-la-insensatez-delvegetariano%26Itemid%3D17

[30] Santos M. Los espacios de la globalización. Anales de Geografía de la Universidad Complutense. 1993;**13**:69-77

[31] Centro de Investigaciones Sociales del Instituto Cubano de Radio y Televisión. Informe Final sobre Consumo Alternativo de Medios Audiovisuales en la capital. Havana: Fondos del CIS; 2015

[32] Chávez R. Otra vez la realidad y "Conducta". Cubadebate. 2014 Available from: http://www.cubadebate.cu/ opinion/2014/11/20/otra-vez-larealidad-y-conducta/#.W-890eK23IU

[33] García Borrero JA. Provocaciones en torno al consumo cultural en Cuba. La Jiribilla. No. 704. 2014. Available from: http://www.epoca2.lajiribilla.cu/ articulo/9092/provocaciones-en-tornoal-consumo-cultural-en-cuba

[34] Ramonet I. Propagandas Silenciosas. Masas, Televisión, Cine. La Habana: Ediciones Especiales; 2002

[35] Escobar A. Desde abajo, por la izquierda y con la tierra: La diferencia de Abya Yala/Afro/Latino/América. In: Regalado J, editor. Pensamiento Crítico, Cosmovisiones y Epistemologías Otras, Para Enfrentar la Guerra Capitalista y Construer Autonomía. México: Cátedra Jorge Alonso; 2017. pp. 43-60

[36] Mignolo WD. Habitar la frontera. Sentir y Pensar la Descolonialidad (Antología, 1999-2004). Barcelona: CIDOB and UACI; 2015

[37] Concepción JR. La cultura empaquetada. Análisis del consumo audiovisual informal del Paquete Semanal en un grupo de jóvenes capitalinos [Degree thesis]. Havana: University of Havana; 2015

[38] García W. Para disfrutar en familia Acercamiento al consumo audiovisual en familia del paquete semanal en redes

**184**

pdf

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

1987

1997;**III**(2):49-85

hegemonía. Ed. Gustavo Gili: Barcelona;

[12] Schlesinger P, Morris N. Fronteras culturales: Identidad y Comunicación en América Latina. Estudios Sobre las Culturas Contemporáneas.

[13] Martín-Barbero J. Recepción: Uso de medios y consumo cultural. Diálogos de

[14] Martín-Barbero J. Globalización y multiculturalidad: notas para una agenda de investigación. In: López de la Roche F, editor. Globalización: incertidumbre y posibilidades. Bogotá.

la Comunicación. 1991;**30**:4-5

Tercer Mundo; 1999. pp. 95-122

[15] Martín-Barbero J. Medios, mediaciones y tecnologías. Signo y Pensamiento. 2002;**21**(41):13-20

[16] García Canclini N. Las culturas populares en el capitalismo. Ediciones Casa de las Américas: Havana; 1982

[17] García Canclini N. El consumo sirve para pensar. Diálogos de la comunicación. 1991;**30**:6-9

[18] García Canclini N. Los estudios sobre comunicación y consumo: el trabajo interdisciplinario en tiempos neoconservadores. Diálogos de la

[19] García Canclini N. La globalización imaginada. Paidós: Barcelona; 1999

[20] García Canclini N. Culturas híbridas. Estrategias para entrar y salir de la modernidad. Paidós: Buenos Aires; 2001

[21] García Canclini N. El mundo como un lugar extraño. Buenos Aires:

[22] Olivera D, Salas J. La investigación en comunicación en Cuba: una mirada

Editorial Gedisa; 2014

Comunicación. 1992:1-9

[1] Castells M. La era de la información. Vol. 1. La sociedad red. Spain: Alianza;

[2] Petras J. Cultural imperialism in the late 20th century. Journal of Contemporary Asia. 1993;**23**:139-148

[4] Stephens NP. Towards a more substantive media ecology: Postman's

[5] Íñiguez L. Heterogeneidad social en Cuba. Entre herencias y renovaciones. In: Collective authors, editor. Miradas a la economía cubana II. Havana: Caminos; 2010. pp. 117-140

[7] Mattelart A, Neuveu E. Introducción a los estudios culturales. México, DF:

[8] Reguillo R. Los estudios culturales. Portal de la Comunicación: El mapa incómodo de un relato inconcluso; 2004 Available from: http://www. portalcomunicacio.com/download/16.

[9] Gámez N. El giro cultural en los estudios de Comunicación; críticas y perspectivas [Master's thesis]. Havana:

[10] Mattelart A. Networking the World, 1794-2000. Minneapolis: University of

[11] De Martín-Barbero J. los medios a las mediaciones. Comunicación, cultura y

University of Havana; 2006

Minnesota Press; 2000

metaphor versus posthuman futures. International Journal of Communication. 2014;**8**:2027-2045

[6] Lindahl H. Fault Lines of Globalization: Legal Order and the

Politics of A-Legality. 2013

Paidós; 2004

[3] Hodder I. Theoretical archaeology: A reactionary view. In: Hodder I, editor. Symbolic and Structural. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press; 1985. pp. 1-16

2000

**References**

**187**

**Chapter 11**

**Abstract**

these decives.

**1. Contemporary mass-media**

and social media, according to Andzulis [1].

**2. The impact of media on human's life**

discussed during this text has dropped out of use completely.

use the media and what they understand cited in Duncan [2].

Contextualization of Social

Media and Its Implications

The term "media" refers to all means for social media in your community news and non news, locale and national. In just over a decade, the influence of social media has evolved beyond being an amusing extra into a fully integrated part of almost every aspect of everyday life for many people. This chapter will discuss the changes within the mass media in the new century and cognize how the traditional media have evolved over the twenty-first century. Besides, it will identify how mass media personnel consider the audience an integral part of business concerns and recognize how mass media personnel consider the audience an integral part of business concerns. Morover, the chapter will highlight the relationship between mass media, innovation, and people. Over the past century, life span has significantly changed, and the advancement of media technology is a major reason for it. Compare a day in a contemporary onse's life with a day in the life of someone from the old generation. Nowadays, there is smartphone, T.V, laptop, easy-to-access internet everywhere, while back in those days, it was almost impossible to find or to imagine having any of

**Keywords:** mass communication, mass media, audience, scoical media

Conventional media covers all the means of communication that occurred before the Internet and technology of media, containing printed materials such as (newspapers, books, magazines), broadcast (T.V. and radio). On the other hand, new media, includes electronic video games and entertainment, and the Internet

Though various forms of mass media rise and fall in recognition, it is worthwhile to note that despite sizeable cultural and technological changes, none of the media

Mass media stuff connects to the most intimate aspects of our life. Within our private situations, they still bind us to the universe. Mass media companies are therefore a major force within culture. They must dig deeper to discover how people

on the Audience

*Mohammed H. Al Aqad*

autónomas de los municipios de Güira de Melena y Artemisa [Degree thesis]. Havana: University of Havana; 2018

[39] Ramos A. Alternativas. Gestión editorial de revistas temáticas distribuidas mediante el Paquete Semanal [Degree thesis]. Havana: University of Havana; 2016

#### **Chapter 11**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

autónomas de los municipios de Güira de Melena y Artemisa [Degree thesis]. Havana: University of Havana; 2018

[39] Ramos A. Alternativas. Gestión editorial de revistas temáticas distribuidas mediante el Paquete Semanal [Degree thesis]. Havana: University of Havana; 2016

**186**

## Contextualization of Social Media and Its Implications on the Audience

*Mohammed H. Al Aqad*

#### **Abstract**

The term "media" refers to all means for social media in your community news and non news, locale and national. In just over a decade, the influence of social media has evolved beyond being an amusing extra into a fully integrated part of almost every aspect of everyday life for many people. This chapter will discuss the changes within the mass media in the new century and cognize how the traditional media have evolved over the twenty-first century. Besides, it will identify how mass media personnel consider the audience an integral part of business concerns and recognize how mass media personnel consider the audience an integral part of business concerns. Morover, the chapter will highlight the relationship between mass media, innovation, and people. Over the past century, life span has significantly changed, and the advancement of media technology is a major reason for it. Compare a day in a contemporary onse's life with a day in the life of someone from the old generation. Nowadays, there is smartphone, T.V, laptop, easy-to-access internet everywhere, while back in those days, it was almost impossible to find or to imagine having any of these decives.

**Keywords:** mass communication, mass media, audience, scoical media

#### **1. Contemporary mass-media**

Conventional media covers all the means of communication that occurred before the Internet and technology of media, containing printed materials such as (newspapers, books, magazines), broadcast (T.V. and radio). On the other hand, new media, includes electronic video games and entertainment, and the Internet and social media, according to Andzulis [1].

Though various forms of mass media rise and fall in recognition, it is worthwhile to note that despite sizeable cultural and technological changes, none of the media discussed during this text has dropped out of use completely.

#### **2. The impact of media on human's life**

Mass media stuff connects to the most intimate aspects of our life. Within our private situations, they still bind us to the universe. Mass media companies are therefore a major force within culture. They must dig deeper to discover how people use the media and what they understand cited in Duncan [2].

#### **2.1 The Internet and social networking**

It is nearly incomprehensible to overstate the impact the Internet has had on media across the previous two decades. At first conceived as an attack-proof military arrange within the 1960s, the Internet has since gotten to be an integral portion of everyday life. With the advancement of the World Wide Web within the 1980s and the presentation of commercial browsers within the 1990s, clients picked up the capacity to transmit pictures, sound, and video over the Internet. Companies rapidly started to capitalize on the modern innovation, propelling web browsers, advertising free web-based mail accounts, and giving web catalogs and look motors. Internet utilization developed quickly, from 50% of American grown-ups in 2000 to 75% of American grown-ups in 2008 [3]. Presently that most of the industrialized world is online, the way we get our news, do trade, conduct inquire about, contact companions and relatives, apply for employments, and indeed observe T.V. has changed totally [4]. For example, several jobs can presently be performed completely from home without the ought to travel to a central office. Meetings can be conducted through videoconference, written communication can happen through mail, and workers can access company information through a server or file transfer protocol (FTP) location [5].

Besides, to extending the speed with which we can get to information and the volume of information readily available, the Internet has incorporated a whole current evenhanded estimation to correspondence. Finding a workable pacemaker of a printed book may take various long periods of confused effort, however finding a good pace distributor of online material requires minimal more than the press of a catch. Much refreshing to Web based life, for example, web journals, long-range informal communication locales, and anyone can contribute considerations on the Internet. Web-based social networking has numerous focal points, including the immediate circulation of news, a wide range of viewpoints on a solitary occasion, and the capacity to speak with individuals everywhere throughout the globe. Albeit some industry investigators have since a long time ago anticipated that the Internet will render print media out of date, broad communications administrators accept papers will develop with the occasions. Similarly, as the radio business needed to reexamine its business technique during the ascent of T.V., paper experts should reconsider their strategies for content conveyance during the age of the Internet.

Nowadays Internet is used for watching news and getting the most up to date update and around the globe [6, 7]. A great deal of people goes to the Internet while grinding away or out home and it is being gotten to all around the globe. This is the explanation you would all news stations and papers have kept up segments and their own sites. These web journals likewise support openings for work for reporters and writers to put their articles and convey data to the great many individuals around the globe.

Vocation in news coverage is comprehensively at request and a huge number of understudies apply for different courses in mass correspondence every year. Because of the rising scramble for systems administration among understudies, a progression of establishments and reporting authority's schools have opened in the significant towns.

Likewise, with all the satellite stations, a dash of Radio stations (F.M.) additionally have come up. Every metropolitan city of India has its diverse F.M. radio broadcasts where many radio racers are working. Print press has likewise gained amazing ground and loads of magazines and English, Hindi and local papers have come-up available.

**189**

*Contextualization of Social Media and Its Implications on the Audience*

Mass correspondence industry is not just confined to the limit of its nation yet has accomplished all inclusive. Furthermore, it covers the entirety of the latest updates and happenings around the globe [8, 9]. The other improvement in mass correspondence area is publicizing administrations. Many little and enormous publicizing offices have come up from the area and there are vocation prospects out

Innovations have evolved swiftly that administrators in conventional media organizations frequently cannot hold command over their substance. For instance, when music-sharing site Napster started empowering clients to trade free music documents over the Web, distributed record sharing cost the music business a fortune in lost Disc deals. Instead of gain by the innovation, music industry officials sued Napster, at last closing it down, yet never entirely figuring out how to get rid of online music robbery. Indeed, even with legitimate computerized music deals through online merchants, for example, Macintosh's iTunes Store, the music business is as yet attempting to decide how to make an enormous enough benefit to

The distributing business has additionally experienced the impacts of innovation (even though paper readership has been in deterioration since the appearance of T.V. furthermore, radio). At the point when papers started creating on the web forms because of rivalry from link T.V., they ended up facing another type of newscasting: novice blogging. At first expelled as inconsistent and one-sided, web journals, for example, day by day Kos and The Huffington Post have picked up validity and huge readerships over the previous decade, constraining conventional columnists to blog and tweet to keep pace (which permits less time to watch that sources are solid or include profundity examination to a story). Customary papers are likewise missing out to news aggregators, for example, Google News, which benefits from giving connects to writers' accounts at significant papers without offering money related remuneration to either the columnists or the news associations. Numerous papers have adjusted to the Web out of need, battling falling course figures and drooping publicizing deals by offering sites, writes, and webcasts and creating reports in video structure. Those that had the foreknowledge to adjust to the innovation are breathing a murmur of help; a 2000–2015 Pew Research Center report found that more Americans get their news using the Web than from papers or radio sources, and that the Web is the third most famous news source behind national and nearby T.V. news. New media has three significant focal points over conventional media. In the first place, it is quick, empowering customers to discover the most recent news, climate forecast, or stock costs at the dash of a catch. Computerized music can be downloaded in a split second, motion pictures can be requested through a link or satellite-on-request administrations, and books can be perused on tablets. In an undeniably quick-paced world, there is little need to hang tight for anything. The subsequent favorable position is cost. Most online substance is free, from web journals and person to person communication destinations to news and diversion sources. Regardless of whether peruses are eager to pay for content once they are accustomed to getting it for nothing is something that the New York Times set to discover in 2011, when it presents a metered expense model for its online paper. At long last, new media can arrive at the most remote pieces of the globe. For instance, if an understudy is searching for data about everyday life in Iran, there is a high likelihood that an individual site page about living in that nation exists some place on the Web. Around half of Europeans, three-fourths of

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.92237*

there for mass correspondence graduates.

**2.2 Current media versus old media**

remain in business.

Mass correspondence industry is not just confined to the limit of its nation yet has accomplished all inclusive. Furthermore, it covers the entirety of the latest updates and happenings around the globe [8, 9]. The other improvement in mass correspondence area is publicizing administrations. Many little and enormous publicizing offices have come up from the area and there are vocation prospects out there for mass correspondence graduates.

#### **2.2 Current media versus old media**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

It is nearly incomprehensible to overstate the impact the Internet has had on media across the previous two decades. At first conceived as an attack-proof military arrange within the 1960s, the Internet has since gotten to be an integral portion of everyday life. With the advancement of the World Wide Web within the 1980s and the presentation of commercial browsers within the 1990s, clients picked up the capacity to transmit pictures, sound, and video over the Internet. Companies rapidly started to capitalize on the modern innovation, propelling web browsers, advertising free web-based mail accounts, and giving web catalogs and look motors. Internet utilization developed quickly, from 50% of American grown-ups in 2000 to 75% of American grown-ups in 2008 [3]. Presently that most of the industrialized world is online, the way we get our news, do trade, conduct inquire about, contact companions and relatives, apply for employments, and indeed observe T.V. has changed totally [4]. For example, several jobs can presently be performed completely from home without the ought to travel to a central office. Meetings can be conducted through videoconference, written communication can happen through mail, and workers can access company information through a server or file transfer

Besides, to extending the speed with which we can get to information and the volume of information readily available, the Internet has incorporated a whole current evenhanded estimation to correspondence. Finding a workable pacemaker of a printed book may take various long periods of confused effort, however finding a good pace distributor of online material requires minimal more than the press of a catch. Much refreshing to Web based life, for example, web journals, long-range informal communication locales, and anyone can contribute considerations on the Internet. Web-based social networking has numerous focal points, including the immediate circulation of news, a wide range of viewpoints on a solitary occasion, and the capacity to speak with individuals everywhere throughout the globe. Albeit some industry investigators have since a long time ago anticipated that the Internet will render print media out of date, broad communications administrators accept papers will develop with the occasions. Similarly, as the radio business needed to reexamine its business technique during the ascent of T.V., paper experts should reconsider their strategies for content conveyance during the age of the

Nowadays Internet is used for watching news and getting the most up to date update and around the globe [6, 7]. A great deal of people goes to the Internet while grinding away or out home and it is being gotten to all around the globe. This is the explanation you would all news stations and papers have kept up segments and their own sites. These web journals likewise support openings for work for reporters and writers to put their articles and convey data to the great many individuals around

Vocation in news coverage is comprehensively at request and a huge number of understudies apply for different courses in mass correspondence every year. Because of the rising scramble for systems administration among understudies, a progression of establishments and reporting authority's schools have opened in the

Likewise, with all the satellite stations, a dash of Radio stations (F.M.) additionally have come up. Every metropolitan city of India has its diverse F.M. radio broadcasts where many radio racers are working. Print press has likewise gained amazing ground and loads of magazines and English, Hindi and local papers have

**2.1 The Internet and social networking**

protocol (FTP) location [5].

**188**

Internet.

the globe.

significant towns.

come-up available.

Innovations have evolved swiftly that administrators in conventional media organizations frequently cannot hold command over their substance. For instance, when music-sharing site Napster started empowering clients to trade free music documents over the Web, distributed record sharing cost the music business a fortune in lost Disc deals. Instead of gain by the innovation, music industry officials sued Napster, at last closing it down, yet never entirely figuring out how to get rid of online music robbery. Indeed, even with legitimate computerized music deals through online merchants, for example, Macintosh's iTunes Store, the music business is as yet attempting to decide how to make an enormous enough benefit to remain in business.

The distributing business has additionally experienced the impacts of innovation (even though paper readership has been in deterioration since the appearance of T.V. furthermore, radio). At the point when papers started creating on the web forms because of rivalry from link T.V., they ended up facing another type of newscasting: novice blogging. At first expelled as inconsistent and one-sided, web journals, for example, day by day Kos and The Huffington Post have picked up validity and huge readerships over the previous decade, constraining conventional columnists to blog and tweet to keep pace (which permits less time to watch that sources are solid or include profundity examination to a story). Customary papers are likewise missing out to news aggregators, for example, Google News, which benefits from giving connects to writers' accounts at significant papers without offering money related remuneration to either the columnists or the news associations. Numerous papers have adjusted to the Web out of need, battling falling course figures and drooping publicizing deals by offering sites, writes, and webcasts and creating reports in video structure. Those that had the foreknowledge to adjust to the innovation are breathing a murmur of help; a 2000–2015 Pew Research Center report found that more Americans get their news using the Web than from papers or radio sources, and that the Web is the third most famous news source behind national and nearby T.V. news.

New media has three significant focal points over conventional media. In the first place, it is quick, empowering customers to discover the most recent news, climate forecast, or stock costs at the dash of a catch. Computerized music can be downloaded in a split second, motion pictures can be requested through a link or satellite-on-request administrations, and books can be perused on tablets. In an undeniably quick-paced world, there is little need to hang tight for anything. The subsequent favorable position is cost. Most online substance is free, from web journals and person to person communication destinations to news and diversion sources. Regardless of whether peruses are eager to pay for content once they are accustomed to getting it for nothing is something that the New York Times set to discover in 2011, when it presents a metered expense model for its online paper. At long last, new media can arrive at the most remote pieces of the globe. For instance, if an understudy is searching for data about everyday life in Iran, there is a high likelihood that an individual site page about living in that nation exists some place on the Web. Around half of Europeans, three-fourths of

Americans, and a little more than one-fourth of the total populace generally have Web access (Web World Stats). This far-reaching arrive to make the Web a perfect objective for publicists, who can speak with their ideal specialty crowds through GPS beacons, for example, profile data on long-range informal communication destinations [10].

#### **3. Mass media, technology, and the community**

At the point when the iPad went at a bargain in the US in April 2010, 36-yearold visual planner Josh Klenert depicted the gadget as "incredibly costly [and] way overrated [4]." The expense of the innovation, in any case, did not deflect Klenert from buying an iPad; he preordered the tablet P.C. when it was accessible and wandered down to Macintosh's SoHo store in New York on opening end of the week to be one of the first to get it. Klenert, and every other person who remained in line at the Mac store during the underlying dispatch of the iPad, is depicted by sociologists as an early adopter: a tech-cherishing pioneer who is among the first to hold onto innovation when it shows up available. What makes an individual be an early adopter or a late adopter? What are the advantages of each? Right now, will find out about the pattern of innovation and how it is diffused in a general public. The procedure and variables impacting the dissemination of innovation is regularly talked about with regards to a dispersion model known as the innovation selection life cycle.

#### **3.1 Mass media and new technology**

As innovation comes to the racks and the quantity of early greater part buyers racing to buy it expands, broad communications outlets are compelled to adjust to the new medium. At the point when the iPad's prominence kept on developing all through 2010 (selling 3,000,000 units inside 3 months of its dispatch date), customary papers, magazines, and T.V. systems raced to frame associations with Apple, propelling applications for the tablet so customers could legitimately get to their substance. Unconstrained by the constrained measure of room accessible in a physical paper or magazine, productions, for example, The New York Times and USA Today can incorporate more itemized detailing than they can fit in their customary paper, just as intelligent highlights, for example, crossword puzzles and the utilization of video and sound. "Our iPad Application is intended to exploit the developing capacities offered by the Internet" said Arthur Sulzberger Jr., distributer of The New York Times. "We consider our to be on the iPad as being like our customary print job—to go about as an astute, unprejudiced channel and to furnish our clients with data they require and can trust [11]."

Due to Apple's choice to boycott streak (the prevailing programming for online video seeing) from the iPad, some conventional T.V. systems have been changing over their video documents to HTML5 to empower full T.V. scenes to be screened on the gadget. CBS and Disney were among the primary systems to offer free T.V. content on the iPad in 2010 through the iPad's worked in internet browser, while ABC gushed its shows through an iPad application. The iPad has even figured out how to resuscitate types of customary media that had been stopped; in June 2010, Condé Nast declared the rebuilding of Gourmet magazine as an iPad application called Gourmet Live. As more media content opens on innovation, for example, the iPad, the iPod, and the different tablets accessible available, it advances to a more extensive scope of purchasers, turning into a self-propagating model.

**191**

*Contextualization of Social Media and Its Implications on the Audience*

**4.1 Characteristics of working in mass media that anyone needs to know**

advertising, there has constantly been an inclination toward papers.

There are consistently special cases to deciding news line-ups. A nearby solid story will supersede national one, and a solid national one will override a universal one and so forth. For instance, the appointment of the President in the US, or an Executive in Australia, would ordinarily be so common over a catastrophic event in some underdeveloped nation. Albeit critical to the individuals and the nation managing the issue, it will be without significance to different countries somewhat, particularly when illuminating. On the likelihood that you are not on a zone T.V., you scarcely start to expose what is underneath. Not to a huge segment of individuals, at any rate. What is more, if you are not on radio news, you are careless concerning an alternate crowd that turns on news radio when their chance on the start and drive to work. However, in

Most experts who work right now, often begin as print journalists. Papers are likewise unmistakable. You can grasp the unmistakable story. You can even remove it with scissors and make photocopies or hit reorder and forward a story to your

It's substantially harder to catch a sound clasp from a radio story, or a video clasp of a T.V. piece. Stations—particularly radio broadcasts—communicate throughout the day. They do not have the room or the free work to spare and chronicle each

Furthermore, it is valid, that papers ordinarily break stories that T.V. what is more, radio broadcasts at that point spread. It is not an incognito that radio and T.V. makers read the morning paper when they are searching for things to fill the day by

Today, individuals can get their report from a huge number of various outlets. There are many outlets on paid T.V. also web radio. You can get to pretty much any paper you need online by the snap of your fingertips. Nowadays, when the whole country returns home from work, perusing the paper and turning on the T.V. If one needs to arrive at in excess of a cut of the segment that you looked for, they need to get into papers, however radio, T.V., and the web, and so on. To have a

The new Pew Research Center examination on where individuals go to for news shows productive reliance on the Web, with a major spike in individuals announcing

Additionally, Detrani [12] revealed that they checked various sources, with 99% of Americans saying that on a run of the mill day, they check the report from at any

T.V. is conspicuous, with 78% of Americans saying they watch nearby T.V. news

The Web is developing productively; 61% of individuals said they checked news on the Web. Radio 54% scarcely beat nearby papers 50% and national papers came

There is additionally a major switch toward online networking, which is presently a typical quality. Individuals are Twittering and Facebooking about stories. The general purpose of mass correspondence is arriving at the majority and attracting them. You could overwhelm the wireless radio transmissions yet miss practically

Nearby T.V. an incredible alternative, arriving at very nearly eight out of ten individuals. Be that as it may, it is multiple times harder to get inclusion on the T.V. news all things considered getting into papers, radio, or the web as cited in McQuail [5].

that they turn on their PDA to investigate news, climate, and sports.

rate one of the accompanying: on T.V., radio, in print, or Online.

and 73% getting their report from systems or link-news channels.

a large portion of the populace—the equivalent with papers.

**4. Expansions of mass media and evolving trends**

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.92237*

chief and collaborators [1].

day communicates and kill at some point.

second and video [7].

bigger effect [12].

in at 17% [12].

### **4. Expansions of mass media and evolving trends**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

**3. Mass media, technology, and the community**

destinations [10].

life cycle.

**3.1 Mass media and new technology**

our clients with data they require and can trust [11]."

Americans, and a little more than one-fourth of the total populace generally have Web access (Web World Stats). This far-reaching arrive to make the Web a perfect objective for publicists, who can speak with their ideal specialty crowds through GPS beacons, for example, profile data on long-range informal communication

At the point when the iPad went at a bargain in the US in April 2010, 36-yearold visual planner Josh Klenert depicted the gadget as "incredibly costly [and] way overrated [4]." The expense of the innovation, in any case, did not deflect Klenert from buying an iPad; he preordered the tablet P.C. when it was accessible and wandered down to Macintosh's SoHo store in New York on opening end of the week to be one of the first to get it. Klenert, and every other person who remained in line at the Mac store during the underlying dispatch of the iPad, is depicted by sociologists as an early adopter: a tech-cherishing pioneer who is among the first to hold onto innovation when it shows up available. What makes an individual be an early adopter or a late adopter? What are the advantages of each? Right now, will find out about the pattern of innovation and how it is diffused in a general public. The procedure and variables impacting the dissemination of innovation is regularly talked about with regards to a dispersion model known as the innovation selection

As innovation comes to the racks and the quantity of early greater part buyers racing to buy it expands, broad communications outlets are compelled to adjust to the new medium. At the point when the iPad's prominence kept on developing all through 2010 (selling 3,000,000 units inside 3 months of its dispatch date), customary papers, magazines, and T.V. systems raced to frame associations with Apple, propelling applications for the tablet so customers could legitimately get to their substance. Unconstrained by the constrained measure of room accessible in a physical paper or magazine, productions, for example, The New York Times and USA Today can incorporate more itemized detailing than they can fit in their customary paper, just as intelligent highlights, for example, crossword puzzles and the utilization of video and sound. "Our iPad Application is intended to exploit the developing capacities offered by the Internet" said Arthur Sulzberger Jr., distributer of The New York Times. "We consider our to be on the iPad as being like our customary print job—to go about as an astute, unprejudiced channel and to furnish

Due to Apple's choice to boycott streak (the prevailing programming for online video seeing) from the iPad, some conventional T.V. systems have been changing over their video documents to HTML5 to empower full T.V. scenes to be screened on the gadget. CBS and Disney were among the primary systems to offer free T.V. content on the iPad in 2010 through the iPad's worked in internet browser, while ABC gushed its shows through an iPad application. The iPad has even figured out how to resuscitate types of customary media that had been stopped; in June 2010, Condé Nast declared the rebuilding of Gourmet magazine as an iPad application called Gourmet Live. As more media content opens on innovation, for example, the iPad, the iPod, and the different tablets accessible available, it advances to a more extensive scope of purchasers, turning into a

**190**

self-propagating model.

#### **4.1 Characteristics of working in mass media that anyone needs to know**

There are consistently special cases to deciding news line-ups. A nearby solid story will supersede national one, and a solid national one will override a universal one and so forth. For instance, the appointment of the President in the US, or an Executive in Australia, would ordinarily be so common over a catastrophic event in some underdeveloped nation. Albeit critical to the individuals and the nation managing the issue, it will be without significance to different countries somewhat, particularly when illuminating.

On the likelihood that you are not on a zone T.V., you scarcely start to expose what is underneath. Not to a huge segment of individuals, at any rate. What is more, if you are not on radio news, you are careless concerning an alternate crowd that turns on news radio when their chance on the start and drive to work. However, in advertising, there has constantly been an inclination toward papers.

Most experts who work right now, often begin as print journalists. Papers are likewise unmistakable. You can grasp the unmistakable story. You can even remove it with scissors and make photocopies or hit reorder and forward a story to your chief and collaborators [1].

It's substantially harder to catch a sound clasp from a radio story, or a video clasp of a T.V. piece. Stations—particularly radio broadcasts—communicate throughout the day. They do not have the room or the free work to spare and chronicle each second and video [7].

Furthermore, it is valid, that papers ordinarily break stories that T.V. what is more, radio broadcasts at that point spread. It is not an incognito that radio and T.V. makers read the morning paper when they are searching for things to fill the day by day communicates and kill at some point.

Today, individuals can get their report from a huge number of various outlets. There are many outlets on paid T.V. also web radio. You can get to pretty much any paper you need online by the snap of your fingertips. Nowadays, when the whole country returns home from work, perusing the paper and turning on the T.V.

If one needs to arrive at in excess of a cut of the segment that you looked for, they need to get into papers, however radio, T.V., and the web, and so on. To have a bigger effect [12].

The new Pew Research Center examination on where individuals go to for news shows productive reliance on the Web, with a major spike in individuals announcing that they turn on their PDA to investigate news, climate, and sports.

Additionally, Detrani [12] revealed that they checked various sources, with 99% of Americans saying that on a run of the mill day, they check the report from at any rate one of the accompanying: on T.V., radio, in print, or Online.

T.V. is conspicuous, with 78% of Americans saying they watch nearby T.V. news and 73% getting their report from systems or link-news channels.

The Web is developing productively; 61% of individuals said they checked news on the Web. Radio 54% scarcely beat nearby papers 50% and national papers came in at 17% [12].

There is additionally a major switch toward online networking, which is presently a typical quality. Individuals are Twittering and Facebooking about stories. The general purpose of mass correspondence is arriving at the majority and attracting them. You could overwhelm the wireless radio transmissions yet miss practically a large portion of the populace—the equivalent with papers.

Nearby T.V. an incredible alternative, arriving at very nearly eight out of ten individuals. Be that as it may, it is multiple times harder to get inclusion on the T.V. news all things considered getting into papers, radio, or the web as cited in McQuail [5].

Today's crowd being so divided methods any arrangement to get press inclusion needs to consider every contingency. You cannot send a similar public statement to each medium outlet and call it great. A discharge that's the correct size for the paper is very long to peruse on the radio.


#### **4.2 Evolving developments**

As indicated by the Endless Dial study directed by Arbitron and Edison Exploration the Web has become the most significant vehicle just because by outperforming television. Being approached to need to choose Web and T.V. 49% of individuals offered an explanation to forsake television contradicted to 48% to desert the web. As well, most fascinating is the wide adaption of advanced media in autos by 24% of individuals utilizing mp3 regarding vehicle media according to Vivian and Maurin [13].

#### **5. Simultaneous T.V./web usage jumps**

In a sign that T.V. what's more, the Web are beginning to combine in viewers' cognizance, more people invested more time seeing the Web and T.V. in December 2017 than in June 2017 or December 2016, as indicated by the Three Screens Report from The Nielsen Corporation according to Wilkins and Christians [14].

In December 2017, 59% of Americans utilized T.V. furthermore, the Web all the while, contrasted with 56.9% in June 2017 and 57.5% in December 2016. On a yearover-year premise, support right now 2.7% as cited in Wilkins and Christians [14].

Tallying singular clients, 134,056 Americans utilized T.V. what's more, the Web all the while in December 2017. This looks at to 128,047 in June 2017 and 128,167 in December 2016. On a year-over-year premise, the quantity of individuals utilizing T.V. furthermore, the web at the same time expanded 4.6%.

Nobody can question the mass arrive at that T.V. empowers, however the fact of the matter is the online channel is presently starting to offer that equivalent degree of crowd reach—yet with ostensibly better commitment and offers. Also, quite often at a progressively reasonable cost.

Clients are likewise investing more time online than any time in recent memory. It depends who's discharging the report (e.g., Nielsen or an online distributer like Netflix and Hulu), however a few assessments show that online media consumption has now outperformed T.V. seeing. As revealed by MSNBC, this is unquestionably valid for adolescents and youthful grown-ups, with time invested online presently outperforming energy spent viewing T.V. or on the other hand chatting on the telephone referring to Wilkins and Christians [14].

**193**

caught [15].

*Contextualization of Social Media and Its Implications on the Audience*

promotions, including brand review, message review, and affability.

clearly it worked—deals supposedly expanded by more than 100%.

**6. Modern media delivery: pros and cons**

Also, the promoters follow the eyeballs. Web based publicizing has been quickly infringing on conventional media's part of the media blend pie throughout the previous quite a long while. What's more, as per Forrester, spending on web-based publicizing is in truth set to overshadow T.V. spends by 2016 as cited in

Furthermore, as indicated by a few examinations, these online watchers might be more connected with and have higher promotion review than those viewing T.V. advertisements. A similar report by Nielsen found that premium online video advertisements would do well to mark sway measurements than customary T.V.

Furthermore, a 2018 review by BrightRoll found that 70% of sponsors overviewed said that online video publicizing is similarly or more compelling than promotions on T.V. Besides, 87% said that video was more powerful than show publicizing. NewMediaRockstars.com gives this information and furthermore calls attention to the accomplishment of the viral YouTube crusade for Old Flavor. Also,

Given the quick take-up of this medium, it's evident that sponsors are seeing incredible incentive in publicizing with online video and grasping the period of

In October 2013, 17-year-old child-care girl Ashleigh Hall maybe a friendship with a handsome 19-year-man on Facebook. Ashleigh, from Darlington, England, and her new companion started chatting on the web. She exchanged phone numbers so they could message one another. The energized young girl to her new friend that she was going out with her new boyfriend, Pete, and that his dad would get her in his car. Sadly, Pete and his father were very much the same individual-convicted rapist Peter Chapman. The 33-year-old homeless sex offender utilized his Facebook alter ego (which included photos of an obscure high school kid) to draw Ashleigh to a confined area, where he assaulted and killed her. Chapman was captured by chance not long after the occasion, and in court he confessed to hijack, assault, and

Ashleigh's awful story shows a few weaknesses of present-day media conveyance: obscurity and untrustworthiness. Albeit person to person communication locales, for example, Facebook are an advantageous method to make new connections and reconnect with old companions, it is implausible of knowing whether clients are who they guarantee to be, leaving individuals (especially receptive adolescents) powerless against online predators. Since a great part of the substance on the web is unregulated, this absence of dependability traverses the whole online range, from reports and Wikipedia articles to bogus publicizing claims and deceitful cheats on

Be that as it may, current media can likewise work to prepare endeavors to stop wrongdoing. The famous NBC television arrangement Dateline: To Catch a Predator followed police specialists who utilized Web talk rooms to distinguish potential kid molesters. Acting like youthful adolescents, cops went into visit rooms and took an interest in discussions with different clients. On the off chance that a grown-up client started a sexual discourse and communicated enthusiasm for meeting the teenager for sexual purposes, the police set up a sting activity, getting the eventual pedophile in the demonstration. In cases, for example, these, the fast transmission of data and the worldwide idea of the web made it feasible for crooks to be

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.92237*

Duncan [2].

associated T.V.

murder.

sites, for example, Craigslist.

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

the more concentrating on what is friendly to them all.

• Newspapers need content and photographs.

• Television stations need more grounded images.

is very long to peruse on the radio.

to the eyes.

issue.

**4.2 Evolving developments**

Vivian and Maurin [13].

**5. Simultaneous T.V./web usage jumps**

often at a progressively reasonable cost.

telephone referring to Wilkins and Christians [14].

Today's crowd being so divided methods any arrangement to get press inclusion needs to consider every contingency. You cannot send a similar public statement to each medium outlet and call it great. A discharge that's the correct size for the paper

• T.V. cannot run with plain words. There must be pictures, something appealing

• To arrive at all of these various socioeconomics and types of media, need all

• Radio require live individuals in the studio or on the telephone, discussing an

As indicated by the Endless Dial study directed by Arbitron and Edison Exploration the Web has become the most significant vehicle just because by outperforming television. Being approached to need to choose Web and T.V. 49% of individuals offered an explanation to forsake television contradicted to 48% to desert the web. As well, most fascinating is the wide adaption of advanced media in autos by 24% of individuals utilizing mp3 regarding vehicle media according to

In a sign that T.V. what's more, the Web are beginning to combine in viewers' cognizance, more people invested more time seeing the Web and T.V. in December 2017 than in June 2017 or December 2016, as indicated by the Three Screens Report

In December 2017, 59% of Americans utilized T.V. furthermore, the Web all the while, contrasted with 56.9% in June 2017 and 57.5% in December 2016. On a yearover-year premise, support right now 2.7% as cited in Wilkins and Christians [14]. Tallying singular clients, 134,056 Americans utilized T.V. what's more, the Web all the while in December 2017. This looks at to 128,047 in June 2017 and 128,167 in December 2016. On a year-over-year premise, the quantity of individuals utilizing

Nobody can question the mass arrive at that T.V. empowers, however the fact of the matter is the online channel is presently starting to offer that equivalent degree of crowd reach—yet with ostensibly better commitment and offers. Also, quite

Clients are likewise investing more time online than any time in recent memory. It depends who's discharging the report (e.g., Nielsen or an online distributer like Netflix and Hulu), however a few assessments show that online media consumption has now outperformed T.V. seeing. As revealed by MSNBC, this is unquestionably valid for adolescents and youthful grown-ups, with time invested online presently outperforming energy spent viewing T.V. or on the other hand chatting on the

from The Nielsen Corporation according to Wilkins and Christians [14].

T.V. furthermore, the web at the same time expanded 4.6%.

**192**

Also, the promoters follow the eyeballs. Web based publicizing has been quickly infringing on conventional media's part of the media blend pie throughout the previous quite a long while. What's more, as per Forrester, spending on web-based publicizing is in truth set to overshadow T.V. spends by 2016 as cited in Duncan [2].

Furthermore, as indicated by a few examinations, these online watchers might be more connected with and have higher promotion review than those viewing T.V. advertisements. A similar report by Nielsen found that premium online video advertisements would do well to mark sway measurements than customary T.V. promotions, including brand review, message review, and affability.

Furthermore, a 2018 review by BrightRoll found that 70% of sponsors overviewed said that online video publicizing is similarly or more compelling than promotions on T.V. Besides, 87% said that video was more powerful than show publicizing. NewMediaRockstars.com gives this information and furthermore calls attention to the accomplishment of the viral YouTube crusade for Old Flavor. Also, clearly it worked—deals supposedly expanded by more than 100%.

Given the quick take-up of this medium, it's evident that sponsors are seeing incredible incentive in publicizing with online video and grasping the period of associated T.V.

#### **6. Modern media delivery: pros and cons**

In October 2013, 17-year-old child-care girl Ashleigh Hall maybe a friendship with a handsome 19-year-man on Facebook. Ashleigh, from Darlington, England, and her new companion started chatting on the web. She exchanged phone numbers so they could message one another. The energized young girl to her new friend that she was going out with her new boyfriend, Pete, and that his dad would get her in his car. Sadly, Pete and his father were very much the same individual-convicted rapist Peter Chapman. The 33-year-old homeless sex offender utilized his Facebook alter ego (which included photos of an obscure high school kid) to draw Ashleigh to a confined area, where he assaulted and killed her. Chapman was captured by chance not long after the occasion, and in court he confessed to hijack, assault, and murder.

Ashleigh's awful story shows a few weaknesses of present-day media conveyance: obscurity and untrustworthiness. Albeit person to person communication locales, for example, Facebook are an advantageous method to make new connections and reconnect with old companions, it is implausible of knowing whether clients are who they guarantee to be, leaving individuals (especially receptive adolescents) powerless against online predators. Since a great part of the substance on the web is unregulated, this absence of dependability traverses the whole online range, from reports and Wikipedia articles to bogus publicizing claims and deceitful cheats on sites, for example, Craigslist.

Be that as it may, current media can likewise work to prepare endeavors to stop wrongdoing. The famous NBC television arrangement Dateline: To Catch a Predator followed police specialists who utilized Web talk rooms to distinguish potential kid molesters. Acting like youthful adolescents, cops went into visit rooms and took an interest in discussions with different clients. On the off chance that a grown-up client started a sexual discourse and communicated enthusiasm for meeting the teenager for sexual purposes, the police set up a sting activity, getting the eventual pedophile in the demonstration. In cases, for example, these, the fast transmission of data and the worldwide idea of the web made it feasible for crooks to be caught [15].

#### **6.1 Advantages of modern media**

On the off chance that Ashleigh's story features the absolute most harmful parts of current media, the brisk scattering of news and data are the absolute most helpful parts of the Internet. As we noted before in the part, speed can be a colossal preferred position of online media conveyance. At the point when a report breaks, it very well may be conveyed quickly through RSS channels and by means of many significant outlets, empowering individuals everywhere throughout the world to find out about a breaking report insignificant minutes after it occurs.

When a Web client has paid for a month to month specialist organization, the greater part of the substance Online is free, permitting individuals access to a boundless abundance of data by means of news sites, web indexes, catalogs, and home pages for various subjects extending from cooking tips to sports random data. At the point when this data turned out to be promptly accessible at the pinch of a catch, numerous writers and innovation specialists composed articles asserting the data over-burden was terrible for people's wellbeing. Fears that the innovation would cause a lack of ability to concentrate consistently clutter, stunt people's thinking, and harm their capacity to sympathize raised by some exceptionally regarded productions, including The Hours of London and The New York Times. In any case, there is no steady proof that the web causes mental issues; actually, measurements show that individuals who utilize long range interpersonal communication destinations have better disconnected public activities, and individuals who play PC games are better at engrossing and responding to data than the individuals who do not, and they experience no loss of exactness or expanded indiscretion [11]. As Vaughan Chime calls attention to in his article about the historical backdrop of media alarms, "Worries about data over-burden are as old as data itself, with every age rethinking the perilous effects of innovation on psyche and mind [16]."

Notwithstanding velocity, reach, and cost, online media conveyance empowers a more extensive scope of voices and points of view regarding any matter. Through nontraditional media, for example, web journals and Twitter, individuals can put their very own inclination on recent developments, mainstream society, and issues that are essential to them without feeling obliged to stay unbiased. An investigation by the Pew Research Center found that nontraditional media sources report on a more extensive assortment of stories than conventional media, empowering singular destinations to build up their own character and voice. The examination additionally found that these online sources center around a profoundly passionate topic that can be customized by the journalists and partook in the social discussion [3, 17]. By opening web journals and web-based social networking destinations to online conversation or discussion, bloggers empower peruses to produce their own substance, diverting crowds from uninvolved customers into dynamic makers. Right now, turns into a common procedure instead of a single direction—the blogger posts an opinion, a reader remarks on the blogger's opinion, the blogger at that point assesses the reader's opinion and updates their viewpoint in like manner, and the procedure rehashes itself until an issue has been thoroughly investigated. Numerous bloggers additionally give connects to different online journals they bolster or appreciate perusing, empowering thoughts with legitimacy to channel through different channels on the web.

#### **6.2 Disadvantages of modern media**

Alongside a developing number of online predators distorting themselves on long range informal communication locales, the web is answerable for a lot of different kinds of falsehood flowing the Internet. Except if clients can recognize

**195**

training.

worldwide.

**7. Conclusion**

producers of mass media.

*Contextualization of Social Media and Its Implications on the Audience*

dependable, fair-minded sources and accurate data, they may end up devouring off base news reports or bogus reference book passages. Indeed, even purported solid news sources are dependent upon incidental mistakes with their source material. At the point when French writer Maurice Jarre kicked the bucket in 2009 at 84 years old, Irish human science and financial aspects understudy Shane Fitzgerald chose to attempt an investigation with Wikipedia. He added anecdotal statements to Jarre's Wikipedia passage and afterward looked as papers around the world (counting respectable sources, for example, The Gatekeeper) replicated his statements in the same words and ascribed them to the writer. Humiliated columnists were later compelled to address their blunders by withdrawing the statements. Composing a subsequent report for The Irish Occasions, Fitzgerald remarked, "If I could so effectively adulterate the news over the globe, even to this little degree, at that point it is startling to consider what other bogus data might be

Albeit most customary media take a stab at nonpartisanship, numerous more up to date online sources are intensely conservative or left-wing. With sites, for example, the Huffington Post on the left of the political range and the Day laborer Report on the right, buyers should know when they are perusing news with an ideological inclination. Pundits dread the pattern toward Internet-based life sources may prompt the limitation of the development of thoughts. If purchasers pick their media circle only predictable with their own political inclinations, they will be

Alongside practical drawbacks, the web likewise has a few financial hindrances. An expanding hole between individuals who can manage the cost of PCs and access to the Internet and individuals who cannot, known as the advanced gap, isolates those who are well off and the poor. Albeit around 75% of US family units are associated with the web, there are holes in access as far as age, salary, and instruction. For instance, an ongoing report found that 93% of individuals matured 18–29 have Web get to, contrasted and 70% of individuals matured 50–64 and only 38% of individuals more than 65 [3]. Comparative variations happen with salary and

These aberrations imply that individuals with lower wages and instructive levels are off guard with regards to getting to online employment postings, data, news, and PC related aptitudes that may help them in the work environment. The computerized partition is considerably progressively conspicuous among created and creating nations. In countries, for example, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Syria, the administration allows almost no entrance to the web. In different nations, for example, Mexico, Brazil, and Columbia, inadequate media communications framework powers clients to stand by amazingly awkward time spans to get on the web. Furthermore, in many creating nations that have poor open utilities and discontinuous electrical help, the web is practically incredible. In spite of its enormous populace, the whole landmass of Africa represents under 5% of Web utilization

This chapter pinpoints the issue of contextualizing of social media and describes

its implication of the individuals. With the instant satisfaction and expediency offered by the raising fields of social media, social reporting, blogging, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter, increasing demand for new technology and new forms of mass communication will have a decisive impact upon both the consumers and

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.92237*

accounted for in the press [18]."

constrained to a restricted political perspective.

#### *Contextualization of Social Media and Its Implications on the Audience DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.92237*

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

find out about a breaking report insignificant minutes after it occurs.

the perilous effects of innovation on psyche and mind [16]."

through different channels on the web.

**6.2 Disadvantages of modern media**

On the off chance that Ashleigh's story features the absolute most harmful parts of current media, the brisk scattering of news and data are the absolute most helpful parts of the Internet. As we noted before in the part, speed can be a colossal preferred position of online media conveyance. At the point when a report breaks, it very well may be conveyed quickly through RSS channels and by means of many significant outlets, empowering individuals everywhere throughout the world to

When a Web client has paid for a month to month specialist organization, the greater part of the substance Online is free, permitting individuals access to a boundless abundance of data by means of news sites, web indexes, catalogs, and home pages for various subjects extending from cooking tips to sports random data. At the point when this data turned out to be promptly accessible at the pinch of a catch, numerous writers and innovation specialists composed articles asserting the data over-burden was terrible for people's wellbeing. Fears that the innovation would cause a lack of ability to concentrate consistently clutter, stunt people's thinking, and harm their capacity to sympathize raised by some exceptionally regarded productions, including The Hours of London and The New York Times. In any case, there is no steady proof that the web causes mental issues; actually, measurements show that individuals who utilize long range interpersonal communication destinations have better disconnected public activities, and individuals who play PC games are better at engrossing and responding to data than the individuals who do not, and they experience no loss of exactness or expanded indiscretion [11]. As Vaughan Chime calls attention to in his article about the historical backdrop of media alarms, "Worries about data over-burden are as old as data itself, with every age rethinking

Notwithstanding velocity, reach, and cost, online media conveyance empowers a more extensive scope of voices and points of view regarding any matter. Through nontraditional media, for example, web journals and Twitter, individuals can put their very own inclination on recent developments, mainstream society, and issues that are essential to them without feeling obliged to stay unbiased. An investigation by the Pew Research Center found that nontraditional media sources report on a more extensive assortment of stories than conventional media, empowering singular destinations to build up their own character and voice. The examination additionally found that these online sources center around a profoundly passionate topic that can be customized by the journalists and partook in the social discussion [3, 17]. By opening web journals and web-based social networking destinations to online conversation or discussion, bloggers empower peruses to produce their own substance, diverting crowds from uninvolved customers into dynamic makers. Right now, turns into a common procedure instead of a single direction—the blogger posts an opinion, a reader remarks on the blogger's opinion, the blogger at that point assesses the reader's opinion and updates their viewpoint in like manner, and the procedure rehashes itself until an issue has been thoroughly investigated. Numerous bloggers additionally give connects to different online journals they bolster or appreciate perusing, empowering thoughts with legitimacy to channel

Alongside a developing number of online predators distorting themselves on long range informal communication locales, the web is answerable for a lot of different kinds of falsehood flowing the Internet. Except if clients can recognize

**6.1 Advantages of modern media**

**194**

dependable, fair-minded sources and accurate data, they may end up devouring off base news reports or bogus reference book passages. Indeed, even purported solid news sources are dependent upon incidental mistakes with their source material. At the point when French writer Maurice Jarre kicked the bucket in 2009 at 84 years old, Irish human science and financial aspects understudy Shane Fitzgerald chose to attempt an investigation with Wikipedia. He added anecdotal statements to Jarre's Wikipedia passage and afterward looked as papers around the world (counting respectable sources, for example, The Gatekeeper) replicated his statements in the same words and ascribed them to the writer. Humiliated columnists were later compelled to address their blunders by withdrawing the statements. Composing a subsequent report for The Irish Occasions, Fitzgerald remarked, "If I could so effectively adulterate the news over the globe, even to this little degree, at that point it is startling to consider what other bogus data might be accounted for in the press [18]."

Albeit most customary media take a stab at nonpartisanship, numerous more up to date online sources are intensely conservative or left-wing. With sites, for example, the Huffington Post on the left of the political range and the Day laborer Report on the right, buyers should know when they are perusing news with an ideological inclination. Pundits dread the pattern toward Internet-based life sources may prompt the limitation of the development of thoughts. If purchasers pick their media circle only predictable with their own political inclinations, they will be constrained to a restricted political perspective.

Alongside practical drawbacks, the web likewise has a few financial hindrances. An expanding hole between individuals who can manage the cost of PCs and access to the Internet and individuals who cannot, known as the advanced gap, isolates those who are well off and the poor. Albeit around 75% of US family units are associated with the web, there are holes in access as far as age, salary, and instruction. For instance, an ongoing report found that 93% of individuals matured 18–29 have Web get to, contrasted and 70% of individuals matured 50–64 and only 38% of individuals more than 65 [3]. Comparative variations happen with salary and training.

These aberrations imply that individuals with lower wages and instructive levels are off guard with regards to getting to online employment postings, data, news, and PC related aptitudes that may help them in the work environment. The computerized partition is considerably progressively conspicuous among created and creating nations. In countries, for example, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Syria, the administration allows almost no entrance to the web. In different nations, for example, Mexico, Brazil, and Columbia, inadequate media communications framework powers clients to stand by amazingly awkward time spans to get on the web. Furthermore, in many creating nations that have poor open utilities and discontinuous electrical help, the web is practically incredible. In spite of its enormous populace, the whole landmass of Africa represents under 5% of Web utilization worldwide.

#### **7. Conclusion**

This chapter pinpoints the issue of contextualizing of social media and describes its implication of the individuals. With the instant satisfaction and expediency offered by the raising fields of social media, social reporting, blogging, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter, increasing demand for new technology and new forms of mass communication will have a decisive impact upon both the consumers and producers of mass media.

It is today's mass communication substance that must adapt and function with each of the new technological changes that emerge from such a dynamic field of study. While we may now just be getting a look of what the future of mass communication might be, the fundamental concept of mass communication—the ability to convey something to a large number of people in the most expedient and efficient way possible; to understand and be understood—always has been, and always will be the core of the process.

Networks and social orders are consistently needing usable and productive intends to pass on data [15]. Mass correspondence is the development of this need. We characterize the mass correspondence as the mutual exchange of messages through the media or innovation-driven channels to an enormous number of beneficiaries, you can without much of a stretch to recognize the various types of mass correspondence you depend on in your own, scholarly, and proficient lives as cited in Wilkins and Christians [14].

These incorporate print, sound-related, visual, intuitive media, and online life structures. A moderately late mass correspondence marvel known as massindividual correspondence joins mass correspondence channels with relational correspondence and connections, where people are presently accessing innovation that permits them to contact enormous crowds. Online networking accomplishes work, It is difficult for a business as it very well may be costly [19, 20]. The expense of not utilizing it is an excessive amount to pay. Business chiefs that "do social media" will pick up turnover, companions, faithful clients, benefits, resource worth, and regard.

Post connects to the posts, data, and substance on a business four online life outlets' that individuals (potential and genuine purchasers) can skim between them flawlessly. There is a streaming site to internet-based life and back and advances. It is a data flow that gets clients in transit like an enrolling digital drive. It is all allowed to utilize—cash in vain from new Internet-based life companions (clients). Web-based life is not private. Google lists everything. Ensure that the business posts solitary uplifting news. Designate somebody in the association to screen web-based life consistently. Plan B is to designate a P.R. Firm to do it expertly.

Utilizing Internet-based life in advertising is something that numerous individuals do not realize they have to know, until they find out about it! Investigate. Start today by discovering progressively about utilizing Online networking to create cash.

#### **Author details**

Mohammed H. Al Aqad

School of Education and Social Sciences, Management and Science University, Malaysia

\*Address all correspondence to: alakkadmohmad@yahoo.com

© 2020 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

**197**

2010;**31**(2):179-188

*Contextualization of Social Media and Its Implications on the Audience*

[12] Detrani JR. Mass Communication: Issues, Perspectives and Techniques. Apple Academic Press; 2016. pp. 85-110

[13] Vivian J, Maurin P. The Media of Mass Communication. 11th ed. Boston, USA: Needham Heights, Pearson; MA:

[14] Wilkins L, Christians CG, editors. The Routledge Handbook of Mass Media

[15] Campbell R, Martin CR, Fabos B. Media and Culture: An Introduction to Mass Communication. New York,

Allyn and Bacon; 1991

Ethics. Routledge; 2020

America: Macmillan; 2011

2010;**11**(1):1-9

Wiley; 1985

Cq Press; 2017

[16] Hovland CI, Lumsdaine AA. Experiments on Mass Communication. Princeton University Press; 2017

[17] Miller R, Lammas N. Social media and its implications for viral marketing. Asia Pacific Public Relations Journal. Australia: The University of Newcastle;

[18] Rosenberry J, Vicker LA. Applied Mass Communication Theory: A Guide for Media Practitioners. Routledge; 2017

[19] Tan AS. Mass Communication Theories and Research. New York:

[20] Trager R, Ross SD, Reynolds A. The Law of Journalism and Mass Communication. United States:

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.92237*

[2] Duncan H. Communication and Social Order. England, UK: Routledge; 2017

[3] Pew Research Center. 2000- 2015. Available from: https://www. pewresearch.org/internet/2015/06/26/ americans-internet-access-2000-2015/

[5] McQuail D. McQuail's Mass Communication Theory. Sage

[6] Hansen A, Cottle S, Negrine R, Newbold C. Mass Communication Research Methods. NYU Press; 1998

[7] Hoggart R. The Uses of Literacy. England, UK: Routledge; 2017

[8] Jensen K. The Social Semiotics of Mass Communication. Sage; 1995

[9] Lazarsfeld PF, Merton RK. Mass communication, popular taste and organized social action. In: Bobbs-Merrill, College Division. London, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage; 1948. pp.

[10] Zheltukhina MR, Klushina NI, Ponomarenko EB, Vasilkova NN, Dzyubenko AI. Modern media influence: Mass culture-mass

consciousness-mass communication. XLinguae Journal. 2017;**10**(4):96-105

[11] Xiang Z, Gretzel U. Role of social media in online travel information search. Tourism Management.

Publications; 2010

62-90, 95-118

[4] Ramsaran-Fowdar RR, Fowdar S. The implications of Facebook marketing for organizations. Contemporary Management Research. 2013;**9**(1)

[1] Andzulis JM, Panagopoulos NG, Rapp A. A review of social media and implications for the sales process. Journal of Personal Selling & Sales Management. 2012;**32**(3):305-316

**References**

*Contextualization of Social Media and Its Implications on the Audience DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.92237*

#### **References**

*Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis*

It is today's mass communication substance that must adapt and function with each of the new technological changes that emerge from such a dynamic field of study. While we may now just be getting a look of what the future of mass communication might be, the fundamental concept of mass communication—the ability to convey something to a large number of people in the most expedient and efficient way possible; to understand and be understood—always has been, and always will

Networks and social orders are consistently needing usable and productive intends to pass on data [15]. Mass correspondence is the development of this need. We characterize the mass correspondence as the mutual exchange of messages through the media or innovation-driven channels to an enormous number of beneficiaries, you can without much of a stretch to recognize the various types of mass correspondence you depend on in your own, scholarly, and proficient lives as

These incorporate print, sound-related, visual, intuitive media, and online life structures. A moderately late mass correspondence marvel known as massindividual correspondence joins mass correspondence channels with relational correspondence and connections, where people are presently accessing innovation that permits them to contact enormous crowds. Online networking accomplishes work, It is difficult for a business as it very well may be costly [19, 20]. The expense of not utilizing it is an excessive amount to pay. Business chiefs that "do social media" will pick up turnover, companions, faithful clients, benefits, resource

Post connects to the posts, data, and substance on a business four online life outlets' that individuals (potential and genuine purchasers) can skim between them flawlessly. There is a streaming site to internet-based life and back and advances. It is a data flow that gets clients in transit like an enrolling digital drive. It is all allowed to utilize—cash in vain from new Internet-based life companions (clients). Web-based life is not private. Google lists everything. Ensure that the business posts solitary uplifting news. Designate somebody in the association to screen web-based

Utilizing Internet-based life in advertising is something that numerous individuals do not realize they have to know, until they find out about it! Investigate. Start today by discovering progressively about utilizing Online networking to create cash.

**196**

**Author details**

worth, and regard.

Malaysia

Mohammed H. Al Aqad

be the core of the process.

cited in Wilkins and Christians [14].

School of Education and Social Sciences, Management and Science University,

© 2020 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,

\*Address all correspondence to: alakkadmohmad@yahoo.com

provided the original work is properly cited.

life consistently. Plan B is to designate a P.R. Firm to do it expertly.

[1] Andzulis JM, Panagopoulos NG, Rapp A. A review of social media and implications for the sales process. Journal of Personal Selling & Sales Management. 2012;**32**(3):305-316

[2] Duncan H. Communication and Social Order. England, UK: Routledge; 2017

[3] Pew Research Center. 2000- 2015. Available from: https://www. pewresearch.org/internet/2015/06/26/ americans-internet-access-2000-2015/

[4] Ramsaran-Fowdar RR, Fowdar S. The implications of Facebook marketing for organizations. Contemporary Management Research. 2013;**9**(1)

[5] McQuail D. McQuail's Mass Communication Theory. Sage Publications; 2010

[6] Hansen A, Cottle S, Negrine R, Newbold C. Mass Communication Research Methods. NYU Press; 1998

[7] Hoggart R. The Uses of Literacy. England, UK: Routledge; 2017

[8] Jensen K. The Social Semiotics of Mass Communication. Sage; 1995

[9] Lazarsfeld PF, Merton RK. Mass communication, popular taste and organized social action. In: Bobbs-Merrill, College Division. London, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage; 1948. pp. 62-90, 95-118

[10] Zheltukhina MR, Klushina NI, Ponomarenko EB, Vasilkova NN, Dzyubenko AI. Modern media influence: Mass culture-mass consciousness-mass communication. XLinguae Journal. 2017;**10**(4):96-105

[11] Xiang Z, Gretzel U. Role of social media in online travel information search. Tourism Management. 2010;**31**(2):179-188

[12] Detrani JR. Mass Communication: Issues, Perspectives and Techniques. Apple Academic Press; 2016. pp. 85-110

[13] Vivian J, Maurin P. The Media of Mass Communication. 11th ed. Boston, USA: Needham Heights, Pearson; MA: Allyn and Bacon; 1991

[14] Wilkins L, Christians CG, editors. The Routledge Handbook of Mass Media Ethics. Routledge; 2020

[15] Campbell R, Martin CR, Fabos B. Media and Culture: An Introduction to Mass Communication. New York, America: Macmillan; 2011

[16] Hovland CI, Lumsdaine AA. Experiments on Mass Communication. Princeton University Press; 2017

[17] Miller R, Lammas N. Social media and its implications for viral marketing. Asia Pacific Public Relations Journal. Australia: The University of Newcastle; 2010;**11**(1):1-9

[18] Rosenberry J, Vicker LA. Applied Mass Communication Theory: A Guide for Media Practitioners. Routledge; 2017

[19] Tan AS. Mass Communication Theories and Research. New York: Wiley; 1985

[20] Trager R, Ross SD, Reynolds A. The Law of Journalism and Mass Communication. United States: Cq Press; 2017

### *Edited by Basyouni Ibrahim Hamada and Saodah Wok*

This book provides a new theoretical framework of determinants that interact together in five hierarchical levels to restrain or produce corruption. The theory suggests a multilevel analysis that tests hypotheses regarding the relations of journalism and corruption within each level and across levels in international comparative research designs. Corruption as the abuse of power for private gain is built into the journalistic, economic, political, and cultural structures of any society and is affected by its interaction within the international system. The important questions of how differences in corruption across countries can be explained or what makes it more or less in a particular society and how press freedom and social media contribute to the fight against corruption are still unanswered. This book represents a significant contribution on the way to answer these critical questions. It discusses a variety of journalism-corruption experiences that provide a wealth of results and analyses. The cases it examines extend from Cuba to Algeria, India, Saudi Arabia, Sub-Saharan African, Gulf Cooperation Countries, Arab World, and Japan. The primary contribution of this book is both theoretical and empirical. Its details as well as the general theoretical frameworks make it a useful book for scholars, academics, undergraduate and graduate students, journalists, and policy makers.

Published in London, UK © 2020 IntechOpen © Ulf Wittrock / iStock

Off and Online Journalism and Corruption - International Comparative Analysis

Off and Online Journalism

and Corruption

International Comparative Analysis

*Edited by Basyouni Ibrahim Hamada* 

*and Saodah Wok*